<el3 



THE 



NEW AGRICULTURE. 



SHOWING 

HOW THE PRODUCTIVE CAPACITY OF THE EARTH 
!S TO BE INCREASED TEN FOLD. 



HOW MOTHER EARTH IS HENCEFOETH TO YIELD UP HEIl 

FIIUITS TEN FOLD MORE ABUNDANTLY, WITH BUT 

ONE-FIFTH OF THE LABOR HITHERTO 

REQUIRED, 



THEOnSfl THE JUDICIODS APPLICATIOH OF WATER. 



KO MORK WINTFR : XO 5IORE srMMKK '. ?f O 9IORX: FAI.K, ! BVT 
AK ETKRSr Ali SrKSIS« ! 



OVIi WORLD HHUFFLING OFF THE LAST RELIC OF BAliBARISM 
\ AND A NEW WORLD LOOMING UP STRONGLY IN 

THE DISTANCE., 

By THOS. R. LOV/E. 



SAN FRANCISCO 



1877. 




Class. 
Book. 



C^4.|^ 



J=a 



COPyRIGHT DEPOSIT 



THE 



NEW AGRICULTURE. 

SHOWINO 

HOW THE PRODUCTIVE CAPACITY OF THE EARTH 
18 TO BE INCREASED TEN FOLD. 



HOW MOTHER EARTH IS HENCEFORTH TO YIELD UP HER 

FRUITS TEN FOLD MORE ABUNDANTLY, WITH BUT 

ONE-FIFTH OF THE LABOR HITHERTO 

REQUIRED, 

THROnGH THE JUDICIOUS APPLICATION OF WATER. 



no nOBE WIKTEB ! KO MOBE SrSISIEB ! BfO MOBE FAI.I< ! BUT 
AN ETEBNAI^ SPBINO I 



VB WORLD SHUFFLING OFF THE LAST RELIC OF BARBARISM 

AND A NEW WORLD LOOMING UP STRONGLY IN 

THE DISTANCE. 

By THOS .R. LOWE. 







SAN FRANCISCO 

1877. 



Entered accordine to Act of CongreBS, in the rear eighteen hundred and serentr-seTen, 

By THOS. R. LOWE, 

In the office of the Librarian of Oonjrress, at Washlneton, D. O. 



^J- 



V 






THE DISCOVERY OF THE ART OF AGRICULTURE. 



i^ .. ♦ «. ^ 



King Solomon said, that ** Where the carcass is, there is 
where the eagles will be;" and about twenty years ago, after 
having passed through eight years of pioneer life in California, 
having taken an active part in the stirring events of that period, 
and the excitement incident to the great gold discovery having 
subsided, in a great measure, and having been as diligent and 
lucky as the average pioneer, and firmly believing that Cali- 
fornia surpassed most other countries nearly as much in agri- 
cultural as mineral wealth, I made quite a large venture in 
the agricultural districts of the great Valley of California — the 
great valley, in this writing, includes the Sacramento, San 
Joaquin and Tulare Valleys — and at the end of four years from 
that date I found myself, financially, a total wreck; and know- 
ing that drouth was indirectly the primary cause of my misfor- 
tune, and after mature deliberation, and with the best of 
reasons from certain natural phenomena that I had noticed and 
watched closely, although I had made an unsuccessful efibrt in 
that direction, I was unalterably convinced that there was im- 
mense wealth and prosperity to be found in bringing land and 
water together properly. Since then I have given the subject 
my undivided attention, or as much of it as I could possibly 
afford, and much more than I should have done injustice to my- 
self and others. About seven years ago, after having devoted, 
for nearly ten years, whatever of ability, energy, labor, capital 
and skill I could command, in the unsuccessful pursuit of it, 
want of means, I thought, was the only drawback; and hap- 
pening, about that time, to accidentally come into possession 
of what was, to me, quite a large amount of money, I thought 
I was close upon the track of it — and with that amount of money 
I could not possibly fail in overhaulingit, and went to work, 
and, with the assistance of three friends, incorporated a com- 
pany — the objects of which, amongst other things, the cutting 
a canal from a point on King's River, near where it debouches 
from the foot-hills in Fresno County, to Antioch, in Contra 
Costa County, via "the west side," for the purpose of irrigation . 
and navigation. There could not have been a more favorable 



field selected anywhere within the bounds of the great republic 
for such an enterprise. My intention was to drive out drouth, 
poverty and land monopoly, that is, from out the country lying 
between these two terminal points, and over the grave of these 
three arch enemies of poor people, plant the homes of tens of 
thousands of prosperous and happy settlers; but, over all, to 
set up one of the most magnificent water monopolies possible 
to imagine. And, whilst engaged in this laudable undertaking, 
and, as I thought, getting along swimmingly, as I had every- 
thing nearly in readiness, after only having used a paltry snm 
of money to send out a lai-ge stream of water through a large 
natural channel, into the middle of a roasting desert, and that, 
too, right in the direction of my objective point. At this stage 
of affairs there were a lot of "cruel messengers" sent against 
me, and so well were their plans laid, and so powerful and 
efiective was the opposition brought to bear against me, that I 
soon found myself bound hand and foot, as it were, and wa.s 
compelled, with intense shauie and mortification, to witness 
others receive tl'e liontir and a modicum of the profit I should 
have gained had I been unmolested. 

Now, I don't wish to complain of having my property and a 
portion of my ideas wrongfully appropriated by others, but I 
protest against the manner of it. I am satisfied the parties to 
that transaction had no idea of the terrible punishment they in- 
liicted upon me; but I will do them the justice to say that I 
don't think it would have made any difference to them had they 
have known it. I had made three signal failures, in the same 
direction, before this one: and at the same time I dreaded fail- 
ure ten times more than I feared death. 

Now I think I can pick out six or seven of these "messen- 
gers" that can vie in cruelty with Jno. D. Lee, Isaac Haight, 
Col. Dame, Klingeusmith, Carl Shurtz, Nephi Johnson and 

. But Vengeance is mine, and I will repay, 

saith the Lord. With that assurance I stand corrected. 

The question has often occurred to me, since I have become 
quieted down, about this transaction^ whether 1 would be will- 
ing, had I the power, to consign those bad old men, who have 
sinned so fearfully against me, to as severe a punishment as I 
have received; and my heart would invariablv and peremptorily 
answer. No. For so wrapped up was I in the subject of irriga- 
tion, and the cutting of irrigation canals, overrunning the land 
with fatness, driving the gaunt wolves, hunger and poverty, out 
of the land, that I was entirely unavailable for any other pur- 
pose; the effect of the aforesaid transaction was literally to 



cover me with an ocean of obscuriiy. I was confident that, 
with the intense application I had given to the cutting of irriga- 
tion canals, and the subject of irrigation proper, notwithstand- 
ing I had as yet never made a financial success of either, that 
with the start I had, if unmolested, I could do more for legiti- 
mate agricuture than any other dozen men in the State of Cali- 
fornia; for I was certain that all that was needed to be done 
was to show the dear, stupid, energetic people of California the 
direct road to financial success without their having to use any 
mental effort, and they would see that the thing went on; aye, 
with a vengeance. But your Californian seems to think it be" 
neath his dignity to have to use his mighty intellect, particular- 
ly in tiie pursuit of agriculture. But after haviug been 
shorn of my occupation and my property in the hands of stran- 
gers^ who were very hostile to me, covered with humiliation, 
shame and mortification, oblivion and obscurity seemed to loom 
np strougly in the distance. For be it I'emembered, that seven 
years ago, irrigation, in the great valley of California, was 
considered by intelligent people to be an impractical humbug. 
But I think that out of much evil has come more good, for in ob- 
scurity one has much chance for reflection, and in my twenty odd 
years of rambling, study and experience on the Pacific Coast, I 
had collected an Immense amount of material, out of which to 
construct an original and perfect system of agriculture, based 
upon the judicious application of water. Thus I went to work 
on this material, and have wrought out one of the most beauti- 
ful things in nature, made the crowning discovery of the nine- 
teenth century, pregnant as it has been of great discoveries. 
Nothing exceeds its grandeur but its simplicity. I have sim- 
ply discovered the Divine plan of agriculture. There is no go- 
ing behind it. The truth is mighty, and must prevail. Every- 
thing in regard to it is gotten up strictly in accordance with the 
unerring laws of nature. Although I have so far failed in driv- 
ing drouth, poverty and land monoply from the small area be- 
tween upper King's River and Antioch, the great discovery I 
have made will drive them all three from the face of the earth 
— will do it easily and gracefully. But I claim to have exer^ 
cised no extraordinary ability, however, in the discovery. The 
discovery of gold in California was the cause of the discovery 
of agriculture. I say the discovery of agriculture, for the rea- 
son that the new agriculture will be preferred to the old, as 
success is preferred to failure; as wisdom is to follj"-; as econo- 
my is to parsimony; and will as surely supplant the old as the 
iron horse supplants the ox team, as civilization supplants bar- 



barisra. Joined with an irresistible attraction, and with a natural 
delight in such matters, circumstances seemed to conspire and 
me have thrown right where I was compelled to observe and 
take notice of the very things in nature that would lead direct- 
ly to it. Beholding the oldest and newest civilization meet 
face to face, had a hand in the discovery, necessity, the mother 
of the arts, has ever had much to do with it, the teaching of 
philosophy and the voice of nature, the hydraulic mines con- 
tributed to it. The effect it will have on the human family no 
man can tell. But of one thing I am certain, that it will be "A 
thing of beauty and a joy forever" to them. One very impor- 
tant effect it will have, it will give material prosperity to the 
laboring classes, and lighten their burden at least one-half. 
Then struggle for existence will not be so great by one-half. 
After it comes into general use, such scenes as transpired at 
Scranton, Pa., last winter will recur no more, where, according 
to the account of the worthy Mayor of that town, there were 
hundreds of young, able-bodied men, willing to work, walking 
around the streets, literally starving. It will solve the food 
problem; and the best of all is, there is plenty of it. Monopo- 
lists may tackle it, but it will be in vain; this carcass will be 
too big for them. There^s too much of it for them, and there's 
no chance to steal it; as well try to steal the Pacific Ocean. 

But the alternative of trying to introduce and inaiigurate the 
new agriculture through the instrumentality of the pen is a 
^'dernier ressorV with me, and it is only afte rexhausting every 
other means I could think of, that I embrace it. But the country, 
I believe, is ripe for it; for here we have witnessed a sustained 
effort for twenty years, and unparalleled energy and enter- 
prise, with all the auxiliaries that could be asked for to boot, 
engaged in trying to make agriculture a success under the 
present pernicious and hateful system, and I think the assertion 
would go unchallenged, "that it was proved to -be a lamentable 
failure;" and -to take the great valley from Redding, on the 
north, to Kern River on the south, farming under this system 
has not paid expenses, take it one year with another and aver- 
age it. I think this thing of raising one good crop, tht;n one 
half a crop, then no crop, has been persisted in long enough to 
satisfy the most sanguine. The necessity for a new depart- 
ment in agriculture is being strongly hinted at by leading 
writers of the press of this State; and notably the distinguished 
editor of the Colusa Sun came very near putting his foot into 
it, when he penned the following item, which I clipped from the 
JSan Francisco Bulletin : 



AN ACRE OF LAkD 

Japan, with a population of about 33,000,000, has an area of 
about 156,600 square miles. This gives a population of about 
210 to the square mile. Nearly everybody has had an idea that 
every acre, almost, of that country was under cultivation; but 
we met a very intelligent gentleman, by the name of Jones, at 
the Commercial Hotel in San Francisco, last week, who had 
just returned from Japan, and who had traveled over the en- 
tire country, and he informs us that less than one- sixth of the 
area is cultivated. This would give as about two inhabitants 
to each acre of cultivated land. At that rate Colusa county 
would support a population of two and a half millions I This, 
you say, is impossible. Why ? 

The Chinese garden just above (Jolusa contains about two 
acres. The garden below town hardly so much. These four 
acres furnish fresh vegetables to all the town of Colusa and 
nearly a third of the county. Every day of the year wagon 
loads of vegetables go out from these gardens, both to town 
and to the country. There are at least two thousand people in 
the town, and the area traversed by theae wagons in the coun- 
try contains a great number, but there are some of them who 
raise their own vegetables, and perhaps some of the town peo- 
ple who do not buy any; but it is safe to say that these four 
acres furnish fresh vegetables to 2,000 peeple ! On an aver- 
age, fresh vegetables are at least one-fifth part of the living of 
these 2,000 people. This would give the entire living of 400 
people, or 100 to the acre 1 If any one will take the trouble to 
inquire, he will find that this estimate is plenty low enough, but 
if we divide by 2 and say 50 to the acre, it is astonishing. 
Each of these gardens require eight or ten hands to cultivate 
them, and what they eat is not missed. 

And this is a country where the rental of land is cheap. They 
cultivate it thus closely from choice and not from compulsion. 
What could they do if put to it by high rentals? When cattle 
raising was the chief industry in this country, we can remem- 
ber when men would growl like the old Harry if another would 
settle within five miles of them, and the idea of a man undertak- 
ing to make a living on a section of land was declared to be 
absurd. This is now changing around somewhat, but it is still 
the idea that a man would not be justified in trying to live on a 
quarter section. There are other productions, fully as profitable 
as wheat, that will employ a man to every five or ten acres. 
And even in wheat it is profitable to employ more labor on the 
land, and consequently do with smaller farms. By planting 
one pound of wheat to the acre, and cultivating it like corn, as 
much as eighty bushels have been grown on one acre of land. 
The land that will not produce more than thirty bushels to the 
acre in the ordinary way, will produce at least sixty planted in 
this way. The difference will hire one man for a month.* Then 
it may be profitable to employ ten or twelve men in the cultiva- 
tion of a quarter section of wheat. Then a quarter section will 
be a big farm. And how large will be the population of Colusa 
county? 



8 

Farmers, go to studying about it. Go to experimenting, and 
see what it is possible to make an acre of land do. — Colusa Sun, 
March Zlst." 

It is the intention here to plainly show how the new agri- 
culturists, 32 in number, with 12 fine work horses, and with a 
complete outfit, can put 320 acres of the ordinary average 
lands of the great valley of California under as high a state of 
cultivation and obtain equally as good a yield per acre as those 
18 Chinamen, above referred to, obtain from their four acres of 
choice land near Colusa, Also to show that the new agricul- 
turists can cake the equivalent of 30 miles square of the aver- 
age land of the great valley, put it in the proper shape for 
scientific irrigation, and within three years after commencing, 
to cultivate and fertilize it; heavily cropping it the while, after 
leaving room enough between each section for an avenue 100 
feet "wide, raise as much produce ofif of it, annually, as was ever 
raised in the great valley of California in one season, besides 
keeping and feeding, from vegetation grown during the time on 
this land, the 9 or 10 million sheep of the valley in the finest 
possible condition. 

And in so doing, the employees engaged in the work will be 
comfortably housed and lodged, and fed upon the fat of the 
land, besides being paid good wages, and the capital invested 
will pay 6 per cent, per month. The equivalent of 30 miles 
square can be carved out of many of the great counties of the 
valley, and scarcely be missed. For instance: Take a strip out 
of the Colusa plains, commencing at the willows, and running 
southward 45 miles for quantity, and 20 miles wide, would give 
the amount; or a strip of land commencing at Antioch, and run- 
ning up the west side of the San Joaquin, 60 miles in length, 
and 15 miles wide, would also give the desired amount; or the 
amount could be carved out of San Joaquin or Stanislaus coun- 
ties with ease. But as I have made a specialty of cutting irri- 
gation canals for so long, and watched irrigation closely, and 
now that the subject is receiving a great deal of attentioii from 
intelligent people in all parts of the State, I think I am pos- 
sessed of some very dearly bought knowledge and experience, 
that will be of incalculable advantage to them; consequently, 
before proceeding to explain ihe new agriculture, we will take 
a review, and see what irrigation has done and is doing for the 
great valley. 

WHAT IRRiaATION HAS DONE AND IS DOING. 

Irrigation, as Captain Mace, the genial landlord of the principal 
hotel in Borden, said, when I introduced Mr. Aug. Wiehe to 



9 

him, February, 1875, and told him that we had come down 
that morning on the freight train from Fresno, and had stopped 
over to have a look at the irrigation works, and that we in- 
tended to proceed on our way so soon as we could get our 
breakfasts, and the passenger train would arrive. Irrigation, 
said the Captain, as he passed us out the bottle and glasses, is 
something the American people know very little about. Some 
of them scarcely know the meaning of the word. "But," said 
the Captain, with a knowing look, "They'll learn." I thought the 
Captain's head was level; thei'eis something about irrigation well 
calculated to deceive. And many intelligent though inexperi- 
enced people are being deceived thereby, and the very class 
that ought not to be, to wit — the immigrants newly arriving in 
California and the industrial and laboring classes. And for 
their benefit, as much as anything else, I have concluded to 
write this article. And right here I will try to throw some 
light on the subject, that they may take hold, with their eyes 
open. 

Irrigation in this valley is considered, practically, to be a 
failure, under the present system, except in a few favored locali- 
ties, and one of them is Mussell Slough, Borden, where the land 
is very level and the settlers, when allowed to use the full of a 
canal, say, for instance, 10 feet wide, and from one to three feet 
deep. But notably Mussell Slough has been a success, and 
sharpers all over tba country will be trying to sell land on the 
strength of the great productions of that locality. On Kern 
River bottom, and about Kingsburg, in Fresno County, it has 
proved successful. Now I will inform the reader the simple 
though material difference berwJeen irrigable land, like Mussell 
Slough, and ordinary plain land, which, to be irrigated, must be 
re-claimed. It's the difference between success and failure. The 
great Mussell Slough country, if you have ever heard of it; if not 
you will be very apt to, if you are in California and take any 
interest in ag; . I ture, because it is the principal oasis in the 
country lying between Stockton and Kern River, a distance of 
about 200 miles. It is one place where land and water are 
brought together very nearly right. (I think, though, we can 
double discount it in the new agriculture.) 

It is a tract of land, I think, two or three townships in ex- 
tent, lying south of lower King's River, and between Kingston 
and Tulare Lake, in Tulare County, California. Muvssell Slough 
is an old ramification of .ag's River, and the tract of land 
which bears its name seems to be a rich alluvial deposit formed 
by the great natural leveling machine, King's River. And 



10 

the land here differs from nearly all the land in the great val- 
ley, which seems to be all important, that where a stream of 
water is run through a field in this section, that it saturates 
and wets the land for a considerable distance on either side of 
the ditch, say for a distance of a quarter of a mile, or, I think, 
further; making the cost of irrigating the land almost nothing 
except keeping the ditches in repair, and original cost of water 
right. Now ninety-nine out of every hundred acres of land be- 
tween Kern River and Stocktou, and throughout the whole area 
of the great valley, differs from the Mussell Slough country in 
this, that you can run a stream of water through the fields out. 
side of that favored locality^ and the ground will be as dry six 
feet from the ditch as it is six miles off. To the uninitiated this 
slight difference might seem trifling, but nevertheless it's all 
important. My idea of the productiveness of the Mussell Slough 
country is immense. But I knew so soon as I was told about 
the quality it had of saturating or seepiug, as I believe it is 
generally termed, that it would astonish the natives. I have 
been told that all land in that locality will not irrigate so easily. 
It's astonishing productiveness taxes one's credulity to believe 
the truth. A well known sheep rancher in the neighborhood 
went down to look at that country, and on his return I asked 
him if he had seen our friend, Dr. Brandt; he said he had me^ 
the doctor at his ranch, and that he had 100 in alfalfa,, and had 
to set apart another 100 acres to stack it on. 

THE CALIFORNIA CENTRAL COLONY- 

Here is a scheme said to ha^e originated in the fertile braips 
of one Wm. S. Chapman, which seems well calculated for much 
mischief, and to entail misery and dissapointment on many poor 
people, and is looked upon with much disfavor by most of the 
intelligent and right minded people of this community. My at- 
tention was first called to it about eighteen months ago by their 
flaming advertisements, but thought they were harmless effu- 
sions. But to my astonishment, they have succeeded in getting 
many gullible people into their trap. Now, there is one trait in 
the character of the people, "The great Yankee Nation", that I 
have always admired, and that is their readiness to believe in rep- 
resentations made to them in regard to different kinds of enter" 
prise, and the confidence they display in taking hold and devoting 
their time and money and labor on the representations so made 
to them by persons in whom they place confidence. In view o^ 
the high character I put upon this peculiar American virtue, I 
think the persons who are lucky enoug'h to gain the confidence 



11 

of these people should be extremely cautions not to abuse it; 
consequently I think the projectors and promoters of this colony 
scheme are committing an unpardonable sin in deluding the in- 
experienced into the belief thiat they can better their condition 
by buying and improving their twenty-acre lots, knowing, as 
well as the reputed projector does, of the manifold obstacles to 
success. As previously stated, there is something about irri- 
gation that is well calculated to deceive; and it seems that these 
schemers are trying their utmost to profit by it, I will here 
try to show up some of their deformities enough to put prudent 
people upon inquiry, and that will develop enough to convince 
people the best thing to do is to let them severely alone. 

Now, my friends, to run water over these rough plains in 
their natural state is an immense labor, a most unhealthy labor, 
and to make any headway at it, you must have the use of quite 
a large stream of water; with a small stream you will make 
but little headway. But it is an indisputable fact that almost 
any soil in a warm climate will produce luxuriant crops, pro- 
vided you water it often enough. But I have heard that gold 
can be purchased too dearly, and I think it has cost in this 
valley about $2 to rain one dollar's worth of produce by irriga- 
tion, on an average, and on land as well or better adapted to 
irrigation than the Colony lands. These lands, to be irrigated 
profitably, must first be re-claimed, and it is the refinement of 
cruelty to entice a lot of inexperienced, credulous, and other- 
wise intelligent people, into an absurd and erroneous system of 
irrigation that has been tried and found wanting. 

If there is a system of agriculture more unwise than the one 
previously described, in which water is not used, it is this at- 
tempting to irrigate these rough lands without first going to 
work and preparing them. I will say to those who have already, 
and to those who contemplate purchasing land in the Colony, to 
go to Centerville, about twenty miles east of the Colony, near 
where King's River debouches from the foot-hills, where irriga- 
tion first <lawned on the San Joaquin Valley, and you will see 
that irrigating these rough lands has been abandoned, and peo- 
ple have returned to the old plan of summer fallowing and winter 
sowing, and content themselves with raising a small crop about 
every other year. I believe Mr. Andrew Jackson and Mr. John 
Wood, two enterprising farmers in this vicinity, flooded small 
tracts of land each, this winter, on account of threatened drouth. 
But oi'dinarily, irrigation, save for gardens, trees and vines, has 
been abandoned in this neighborhood. Out of the eight or nine 
million acres of land in the great valley, outside of the tule 



12 

lands, and that subject to annual overflow, and land like that at 
Mussel! Slough, there is not, I think, 100,000 acres, that, to be 
irrigated profitably, but will have to be prepared, notwith- 
standing some people are raising large crops without first pre- 
paring their land, but I do not think they are doing it with much 
profit. It may do for a drouth, but as a general thing people 
will not do it. When I have seen people in this vicinity wading 
in mud and water up to their knees, the thermometer at 110 
in the shade, building little levees around little patches 100 
feet square, I was shocked, and came to the conclusion at once, 
that if something could not be done to relieve people from this 
abominable work, that irrigation should become a failure. 

To irrigate those Colony lands without reclamation nieans 
JDst such work. And such work means fully disappointment, 
disease and misery. 

The Fresno Canal and Irrigation Company is at present 
in possession of the canal that furnishes water to that Colony. 
A settler, in procuring a water right from those people, should 
first inquire into their title, and no settler should purchase a 
water right from any company without having it expressed in 
writing that he must have all the water necessary to irrigate 
what land he desires to cultivate. Experience has taught farm- 
ers here that when they do attempt to flood their land they 
require a large stream of water. Not less than would fill a 
flume five feet wide and one and one-balf feet deep. 

The above named Company have disposed of Rome water 
rights confining the farmer to one foot of water, not allowing 
him to exchange with his neighbor, and should he want to use 
a large stream would have to make terms with them, and 
then they would be charged all the same as though they had 
no water right — now they are trying to induce people by 
f*very means they can think of to buy those Colony lots whilst 
they have possession of the water ; and for the present, allow 
people to use all the water they want. 

Now to make these Colony lands or any of the ordinary plain 
lauds in this valley available for any practical purpose, the first 
thiog to be done will be to bring water on to them; and then it 
is quite as important to prepare them for irrigation. Without 
that there is neither pleasure nor profit in them. The only suc- 
cessful attempt I have ever seen made to prepare so large a 
tract for irrigation was made by Major A. M. Turpin, three 
miles below Centreville on the King's River plains, who has 
leveled off one and one-half acres to a water level. It cost him 
the labor of one man and two horses for sixty-siat days, at the 



13 

rate of $132 00 per acre, counting his man and team three dol- 
lars per day. 

Very few people can readily realize the situation as my 
friend, Capt. Mace, well said; "Irrigation is something that 
the American people know very little about." And it is some- 
thing that I personally know to be well calculated to deceive; 
and wherein I think I am well able to point out to the reader, 
and intend so to do. I am satisfied that it is the hope of the 
country, and will be the means of an entire new departure in 
agriculture; that it will transform farming from the poorest 
occupation to the most remunerative and attractive one there 
is. But to set a lot of inexperienced people to work at this 
late day to putting out trees, vines and shrubbery on these 
rough lands is doing both them and the country great injustice. 
They had as well be set to raising cotton before the invention 
of the cotton gin. It is well calculated to disgust people with 
irrigation. These plains need reclamation as badly as do the 
tule lands in the Colorado desert, for in their natural state they 
are only calculated to deceive the unwary. For I hold that 
what we cannot do with profit we virtually cannot do at all. 

It may do well enough for some rich men, I know, to indulge 
in this pastime, but not for the industrial and laboring classes. 
A farm of three or four hundred acres of land, that was one of 
the first farms irrigated on King's River with ditches, with first 
water rights running wherever necessary through it, changed 
hands about two months ago for less than ten dollars an acre, 
and was not considered anything of a bargain at that. Some 
people will say, "Oh, they have chills and fever on King's 
River near Centreville." Yes ; and when people go to work to 
irrigate rough lands, such as about the best of these plain lands 
are, in the manner I have described, they will certainly have 
them. The Chinamen working on the ranch of that enterpris 
ing and highly esteemed gentleman, Mr. F. T. Eisen, near the 
California Central Colony, are said to have been literally shaken 
out of their boots last summer with the chills, caused by wad- 
ing in the mud and water trying to irrigate his vines and trees, 
and his land is as level as the best lands in this community, and 
is better adapted to irrigation than nine-tenths of the land in the 
country. But for all that they should have been prepared the 
first thing after getting the water on them. When I started in 
after water seventeen years ago I thought it was a cure for all 
the ills that California agriculture was heir to; and after fol- 
lowing it up closely, studying it profoundly, "sounding all its 
depths and shoals," I am not only fully confirmed in what I 



14 

then thought, but am perfectly satisfied that it is to be the chief 
nourishment and principal factor in all scientific agriculture, 
not only in California, but throughout civilization — that it 
will be the most efficient and cheerful servant employed by 
mankind — that it will do more to ameliorate and elevate the 
condition of the laboring classes than any other instrument in 
the hands of the Lord. But I don't think it necessary that Cal- 
ifornia and all creation should have to go through all the bitter 
experience, defeats, mistakes, disasters and failures thatlhave. 
I think 1 have found and can point out the direct road for the 
industrial and laboring classes everywhere to health, wealth 
and wisdom. In my first efforts I thought, in the simplicity of 
my heart, that when I had a constant stream of water running 
through) a dry plain, that I held a key that would unlock the 
agricultural wealth with very little trouble ; and it took me a 
wonderful loug time to find out the reason why farmers would 
not avail themselves of the great advantages held out to them 
to buy water, irrigate their lands, and raise fifty or sixty 
bushels to the acre instead of ten or twelve. Mr. J. D. Forth- 
camp, that efficient little Dutchman that is and has been Super- 
intendent of the Henrietta ranch for several years, came near 
hitting the nail on the head, three or four years ago, whilst I 
was riding out to the ranch one day with him on hia wagon, 
when he said, "These large landholders think so soon as the 
big canals are completed, and running out to the plains full of 
water, that then we will have no more trouble from drouth, and 
that everything will be lovely." " But," said he, "the battle 
will have scarcely commenced ; that without first preparing 
the land the water had as well remain in King's River." But it 
was an impenetrable mystery to me, after I had run out two or 
three ditches of water through settlements whose only draw- 
back was lack of moisture, for they could get a good price for 
their produce. I thought it must be lack of foresight, industry 
or enterprise surely for on the Umatilla meadows they could 
get two or three cents per lb. for barley. But after coming 
down to Centreville, Fresno County, and seeing energetic and 
industrious people try it thoroughly and abandon it, I knew 
that something must be done or irrigation would never come into 
general use on this coast. 

After a sojourn on this Coast for nearly twenty-eight years, 
taking a lively interest in eyerything pertaining to agriculture 
the while, and having studied the facilities for irrigating the 
great valley, and having examined most of the water courses 
leading in to it, I have no hesitancy in saying that there is, if 



16 

proper steps are taken for the ecouoinical use and distribution 
of it, an abundance of water to irrigate every acre of land lying 
between Redding at the upper end of the valley and Kern River 
at the lower end. I came to the conclusion long since that 
Nature intended the great valley to be irrigated, and after see- 
ing the spleTidid effort to make farming without water a failure, 
and after seeing the attempts at irrigation save in a few local- 
ities prove futile, 1 came to the conclusion that oine-tenths of 
the great valley was either good for a high state of cultivation 
based upon the judicious use of water or good for nothing. 
What value is there in laud that a hard-working and ordinarily 
intelligent farmer, with all the necessary appliances and means 
to boot, cannot more than make a living on? I admit that much 
of it is fair to look upon, especially in the springtime, when it has 
"all its bravery on." But that is of no great practical value. 
About five years ago I went to work in earnest to originate a 
system of agriculture, based upon the judicious application of 
water, and flatter myself that I have been eminently success- 
ful. I think I have certainly found Great Nature's plan. 
Whilst I was searching for an island I have discovered a conti- 
nent. It's not only applicable to these rough plains in the great 
valley of California, but to all creation : and so soon as it 
comes into general use failure of crops in California will be 
known no more forever. I was absent from this State during 
the dry season of '64, but from what I can learn there was plenty 
water ran to waste in the different water courses, had this 
system been in operation, to have raised more bountiful crops 
than was ever raised in this country. One of the manifold ad- 
vantages of this system is, that the land will at all times be 
prepared to receive the water, and all that will have to be done 
when the water comes will be to open the gate and let it on, 
for the water will go of its own volition right where it will be 
needed. Human nature seems, of all things, to dislike innova- 
tion. People become joined to their idols, and it's hard to get 
them out of their old habits, especially when they have been 
joined to them for centuries, I will cite a case in point of hu- 
man nature unadorned. When the English conquered India 
they found millions of the natives engaged in agriculture over 
a vast and fertile plain, irrigating their lands with water 
pumped from wells. Some English capitalists and engineers 
thought they saw a splendid chance for a speculation in furnish- 
ing water to the aforesaid natives, by means of canals ; and 
straightway went to wo.rk, and with an enormous outlay of 
eapital, skill and labor succeeded in the construction of an im- 



16 

mense canal out of the river Ganges, through this great plain, 
thinking, of course (as who would not), that the natives would 
joyfully patronize them ; but, to tiieir astonishment, the natives 
persisted in their time-honored custom of pumping water out of 
their wells, and told the canalmen that " their fathers irrigated 
their lands by pumping water, and what was good enough for 
their fathers was good enough for them." That was a pretty 
good joke on those speculators, wasn't it? I believe they were 
only out about sixty-five million dollars, and the authority, above 
quoted said that the waters of the canal ran to waste for thir- 
teen years without paying the cost of keeping it up ; but finally 
the natives figured it out, through their massive intellects, that 
they could do better by patronizing the canal ; since when the 
canal has paid at the rate of 36 per cent, per annum. Of all 
people the American are the farthest from being like these na- 
tives ; but still that is human nature, and all people are that 
way more or less. Agriculture is the natural occupation of man- 
kind and the most important of all the sciences. It is the 
mother of the whole family of sciences. Without it literature, 
painting and all the fine arts and all the useful arts would per- 
ish. I was speaking to a young gentleman, a few evenings 
since, who steps in to see me occasionally, and one who has 
made one or two unsuccessful farming ventures in this vicinity, 
about farming systematically. After listening to me sometime, 
he remarked, dryly, "That people who had wits were supposed 
to do something else ; that farming was for people without 
wits." Erroneous though it is, it seems to be the ruling idea 
.that is abroad in the land. That distinguished, cultured and 
honey-tongned gentleman, Hon. Horatio Seymour, says loudly, 
"That something must be done to make agriculture attractive ; 
that the young men are leaving the farms and swarming into 
the cities." The cry comes up from New Hampshire that over 
two thousand farms have been abandoned from the fact that the 
fields are exhausted of fertility and tenants cannot afford toreiit 
them. 

A gentleman in San Francisco, lately, after listening atten- 
tively to a learned professor eloquently orate on agriculture, 
made the practical and pertinent remark that some light should 
be given the farmers that would assist them financially. Here 
are some important facts set forth. It shows that there is some- 
thing radically wrong in the agriculture of the present. 

The great source of trouble with the agriculturists of the pres- 
ent day is, they have boldly set nature's laws at defiance, and 
again they have exhausted all their ingenuity in the perfecting of 



17 

machinery to put in crops and harvest them; and whilst they have 
been eminently successful in these, they have invariably over- 
looked the most important branch — that is, the science of fertiliz- 
ing— treated it with the utmost contempt. The most impor- 
tant thing, as one writer has well said, "Is to farm good land.'' 
The new agriculturists intend, in revenge for the neglect vis- 
ited on the fertilizing branch, to set that branch so far ahead that 
the agriculturists of six thousand years hence will have no im- 
provement to make; and will proudly say, with those natives 
above referred to, that what was good enough for their fathers 
will be good enough for them. 

THE GREAT LEVELING MACHINE. 

In preparing land for the new agriculture, and the subse- 
quent operating of it, the mechanical forces of nature will be 
called upon to take an active part. To prepare land for irriga- 
tion proper is a subject of the first importance to the California 
agriculturist, although it is not generally known, and is a sub- 
ject well worthy of the best minds in the country. My process, 
for which I hold letters patent, is peculiarly a California inven- 
tion, and would have taken, at least, centuries longer in any 
other country to have dropped upon it. The lands in this or 
any other county, tule lands excepted, generally lay on an in- 
cline, generally conforming to the nearest water course. To 
show how it is done, let us take, for instance, 320 acres of that 
smooth land lying between Woodland and Cacheville, in Yolo Co. 
It's nice, smooth, level-looking land, but in no wise susceptible 
of profitable irrigation, without first being reclaimed. You at- 
tempt to irrigate it as it is, and you will literally think there's 
mountains in it. We will say that it has been purchased by a 
Co-operation Co. That the district system of irrigation is in 
operation. That the following described tract of land com- 
prises the Cache Creek district, to wit: A line drawn due east 
from Duningan to the Sacramento River, at Knight's Landing, 
is the northern boundary, and from thence down along the edge 
of the tule to a point half way between the sink of Cache Creek 
and the sink of Putah for the eastern boundary, and from 
thence due west to the foot-hills for the southern boundary, and 
from thence northerly along the base of the foot-hills to the 
place of beginning for the western boundary. 

That the said district has condemned, for the public use of said 
district, all the water rights and frauchises, and all aqueducts 
canals and ditches leading out of Clear Lake and Cache Creek, 
and constructed a good and sufficient dam across the bead of 



18 

Cache Creek, where said creek runs out of the lake; said dam to 
be high and strong enough so as to raise the water in the lake 
6 ft. above high water mark, and to hold it until wanted, with 
the lake tapped 6 ft. below low -water mark. Then district 
canals, running within a mile or so of each other, to which all 
land owners are to have access, by paying their pro rata for 
keeping them in repair. By having the improvements above 
described around the lake, they will have plenty of water all 
the year round, and immunity from drouths. 

But the writer knows these people of Yolo Co. of old. They 
don't think there is anything in irrigation. He tried to induce 
them to irrigate their lands, when he was here IT years ago, by 
assisting to the extent of one-fourth in the construction of the 
Cacheville agricultural 'ditch, the second irrigation ditch con- 
structed in the great valley (Col. James Moore having built 
the first one). But they wouldn't then and haven't since 
availed themselves to any extent of the advantage of it. When 
this writer thinks a certain system is wise and good for people, 
and tries his level best to enforce his views on them, and 
they will not accept of them, he is in no wise violent about it. 
He thinks they are but exercising their high prerogative. 
And perchance, if his efforts are derided and laughed at, he is 
very apt to subject himself to a rigid self-examiuationj and see 
if those who laughed were not in the right of it. But after taking 
all the facts in the case into consideration, he still thinks he is 
in the right; he always reserves the privilege of bringing the 
matter up again in a different shape. 

And now he comes back to the place from whence he started, 
like one of the idlers tiiat are said to have laid the foundation 
of Amsterdam. He thinks he has found a royal road to irriga- 
tion, whereby a couple of robust, intelligent, twelve year old 
children can do the work in forty minutes necessary to irrigate 
to perfection 320 acres of land, by simply raising and lowering 
a few gates. For, you see, he don't often start in after any- 
thing; but when he does, he goes in to stay — that is, so long as 
he thinks he is right; or perhaps can. 

As aforesaid, let us take this half section, which is the south 
half of section — T — R — , lying parallel with Cache Creek, 
which has a district canal running full of water right on the 
upper line of it; and we are allowed to use all the water we 
want out of it. The first thing to be done is the work of the 
engineer, who tries it with the leveling instrument, and finds 
out, perchance, that the altitude lowers, commencing on the 
west line close to the district canal, going eastward at the ratQ 



19 

of 6 feet per mile; or, in other words, this tract of land higher which 
is one mile long and one-half mile wide, is 6 feet high at the west 
end where the district canal passes it on the east end. To 
put this tract in proper shape for scientific and profitable irri. 
gation, we will divide it into four difi"erent tracts: commencing 
on the lower end, we will measure ofi" three one hundred acre 
tracts, running up for quantity, leaving a strip 10 rods wide and 
160 rods long on the upper side, but making calculation to 
leave the amount of ten acres on the outer edge of the main 
tract for levees, roads and ditches. We will commence work on 
the lower tract the farthest from the district canal. We put a 
levee nine feet wide at the base, and three feet wide on top, 
around three sides of it — the levees to be one and one-half 
feet higher all around than the land will be after it is leveled, 
and as this land has a fall of six feet to the mile, and as these 
100 acre tracts each embrace nearly oue-third of a mile, they 
are, of course, two feet higher on the upper side than the lower. 
To put them on a water level, we have one foot cutting on the 
upper side and one foot filling on the lower side; consequently, 
our levee will have to be two feet six inches high on the lower 
side, the levee on the other two sides will taper in height, as 
they approach the upper end, until they will be only six inches 
higher than the surface of the ground is on the upper side. The 
other two one hundred acre tracts we will prepare in like man- 
ner, making the lower levees of the upper tracts serve as upper 
levees for the tracts below them. Now wc have these tracts in 
a shape so that when we fill them full of water to the tops of 
the levees the water will stand six inches deep on the upper 
side and two and one-half feet deep on the lower side; but we 
to prepare them in such manner that when the water stands 
one-half inch deep, on any portion of them, that the ground in- 
side the levees will be entirely submerged with water. The 
next thing we will do will be to insert two boxes in each of 
the lower levees, with stationary gates in them just as high 
above the surface of the land as the land will be after it is lev- 
eled. And as we have seen that we have one foot cutting on 
the upper side and one foot filling on the lower side, then our 
stationary gates will be one foot high. The boxes in the 
levees must be sunk in the ground so that one-half of them will 
be below the top of the stationary gate, and one-half above it, 
for the gates will be so arranged that, to close them, they will 
be raised up and to open them so as to let the water pass out, 
they are then to be dropped. It must be understood that there 
are to be sliding gates, that are to be lowered and raised just 



behind the stationary gates. The reason for having them so ar- 
ranged will be very apparent in the subsequent operations; as 
the water can be either dashed out in torrents, by suddenly 
dropping them, or let out gently by gradually lowering them, 
and compelling the water to run over the gate, dropping into 
the box below, without disturbing the level of the land near it. 
Now we will put a levee on the lower side of the narrow strip, 
two feet high, above described, with levees joining it to the 
district canal, which has embankments three feet high. Now, 
according to the regular fall in this land, the ground on this 
strip of land ten rods wide is two and one-fourth inches higher 
on the upper than the lower side; to level this we will have 
one and one-eighth inches cutting, and one and one-eighth inches 
filling; consequently, our stationary gates will be one and 
one-eighth inches high above the surface. Therefore, the boxes 
will have to resemble the others. To level this narrow strip of 
land will not be much of a job. But to do this, wc will require 
a stream of water under pressure. Say, for instance, what will 
pass through an inch muzzle under 200 feet pressure, with ihe 
necessary hose to accompany it; said pressure to be obtained 
either by bringing water from great elevations in pipes, or by 
using steam force pumps, mounted on wheels. In this case we 
will use the latter. We now have a strip of land ten rods wide 
and 160 rods long, with one and one-eighth inches cutting from 
the upper and one and one-eighth inches filling on the lower 
side. We have to remove the high portion down against the 
lower levees. In this case, on account of the narrowness of the 
strip, we can keep our engine on dry ground on the other side 
of the district canal. We will go to work just as the miners do 
when they want to remove a bank of dirt. Steam will be got- 
ten up, water pumped out of the district canal, just as the steam 
fire engines do. An experienced hydraulic miner will man the 
hose, and fire away at the higher portion of the ground; and it 
is well known to that fraternity, at least, that there is no better 
instrument to tear up ground than a stream of water under 
great pressure. He reduces the higher portion of this ground 
to thin mud, much faster than a team of ten horses could plow 
it; and the thin mud in this case has the happy faculty of gravi- 
tating to where it is wanted, down in the low ground alongside 
of the levees. But, in case it does not move with the celerity 
he likes, he will know how to sweep it down with the water, 
like a woman does the dirt with a broom. Whilst operating on 
one end of this strip, the water from the hydraulic must be 
compelled, by closing the gate near by, to run to the furthest 



gate to make its escape, so as to give it a chance to deposit all 
the sediments. The engine must be moved up to the face about 
every 200 feet, so as to keep it as close to the work as possible. 
When he gets to the lower end and looks back, he will be very 
apt to see the ground on the desired level. There's one job 
done, without much trouble. But we have got a little ahead of 
Our work. Before commencing to level this strip temporary 
ditches should have been made all along the upper side of each 
of the hundred acre tracts, six feet wide and one foot deep, close 
under the levees that ruu along on the upper side of each — said 
ditches to be extended down along the end of the high portion 
of the ground that is to be removed, and the gates of all 
those of the levels should have been raised high enough to back 
the water so as to entirely submerge the land inside the three 
lower levels for the purpose of softening the ground, and mak- 
ing it easy to hydraulic. 

Now we will commence the second level (which is the upper 
of the three large tracts). We arrange our engine differently, 
as each of these tracts are about 1,100 feet in width, and as 
the upper half of each is above grade, we will have a face of 
850 in width to work upon, and instead of only one man with 
one hose and pipe, we will use eight men, each with a hose and 
pipe, disposed along the face of the higher portion of the ground, 
106 feet apart. But the streams will have to be smaller accord- 
ingly; one-half of the streams starting out on either side of the 
engine. We will not require of them the entire work of trans- 
porting the higher portion of the ground; the most we will ask 
of them will be to dig up the ground in front of them, and con- 
vert it into thin mud ; and to assist the big head of water, we 
will dash down, through those temporary ditches, the embank- 
ments on the lower side of said ditches, to be washed away as 
fast as the work proceeds. We will start in on the second level 
on the end that the temporary ditches were extended down 
along; the narrow strip that we have leveled, we will now use as 
a reservoir. We will get our water to supply the engine and 
hose-pipe out of the said reservoir by means of a large hose- 
pipe extending to small boxes that we will insert in the levees. 
We will raise all the gates in the lower side of the narrow strip 
to their full height, open the district canal, and filling the reser- 
voir to the top of the levees, get up steam in our engine The 
hose-men will commence piping on the face of the bank in front 
of them. Each of them will have what the miners call a breast 
in front of them 106 feet wide. They will be able to deal tre- 
mendous blows, as their streams of water, under heavy pressure. 



are calculated to throw a stream of water a distauce of 150 feet 
each. They will be particularly enjoined not to strike deeper 
than is actually necessary, or any deeper than the cutting is in 
front of them. When they have a space in front of them torn 
up the full width of their breasts, and 27 feet into the land, and 
converted into thin mud, then the gate furthest from them in 
the reservoir will be dropped suddenly, and a flood of water 
will rush out of the reservoir in a stream ten feet wide and two 
feet deep, like a torrent down through the temporary ditcii (the 
embankments on the sides of which must be high enough to 
hold it, as the upper side will be protected by the substantial 
levee) to the scene of action, when it will gather up the thin 
mud the hose-men have been manufacturing and sweep it off 
like a tidal wave, and carry it off and deposit it in the lowest 
places to be found, and especially will it fill up and hermeti- 
cally seal all the squirrel and badger holes; the thin mud will 
run into them like molten lead. The man who mans the gate 
will not allow the flood to run longer than five minutes, but will 
raise his gate and allow his reservoir to fill. The gate in the 
district canal will be so arranged that when the reservoir is 
full the water will waste over it. There should be several 
wide gates admitting water out of the district canal into this 
temporary reservoir, so that it will fill without delay. After the 
flood subsides the hose-men will be astonished to see how clean 
a sweep those angry waters have made of the mud. It will 
seem that the waters were not content to take only what of 
the ground was dug up by the hose-men, but would scour deeper. 
The water, as before stated, must be compelled, by raising the 
gates on the lower side of this level nearest the scene of action, 
to run to the gate furthest from the scene of action (which gate 
will be dropped, and the water only have to pass over the top 
of the stationery gate) to make its exit; and the gates on the 
two levels below, whilst the leveling process is going on in 
this one, must be raised so as just to admit of the water passing 
over them. When the flood subsides, a row of thin plank 
joined together, and set up edgewise, must be the full length of 
the face of tbe high ground, so as to make a temporary wing 
dam for the purpose of holding the next flood up to the face 
and to keep the new made mud from running back on the ground 
that was cleaned ofi". When an advance has been made 200 feet 
into the land, the engine must be moved up close to the front, 
by means of putting down wide plank, crosswise, six feet apart, 
and then laying stage plank on top of them, making a tempo- 
rary track in this manner, from where it ia fijst stationed, to 



23 

where it will be halted at the front. Then all hands take hold 
and send it up with a rush. When this level has been passed 
over in this manner this leveling- company will start back on 
the next level below, subjecting it to the same treatment, 
meanwhile using this one for the same purpose as the upper 
level was used (for a reservoir, etc). My friend, Mr. McCall, 
can build all the levees and ditches above described in a day, 
with his patent levee and ditch builder, using twelve horses and 
two men. 

The dirt to build these levees invariably to be taken from the 
inside; veteran h^'draulic miners will be astonished to find out 
what slight resistance these valley lands oppose to the power- 
ful stream of water under pressure. Now to level one of those 
100 acre tracts, which, 2640 long and 1700 feet wide, thecutting 
being one foot on the upper side and running out to nothing at 
the distance of 850 feet, which, to double it up, would equal 
425 feet wide and one foot deep, and 2640 feet x 425 feet would 
equal 1,122,000 cubic feet divided by 27, would equal 41,555 
cubic yards at 25 cents per cubic yard for digging it up in the 
ordinary manner, removing it the average distance of 850 feet, 
and spreading it out evenly; which is as cheap as it probably 
can be done, would cost $10,385y'^^5^, or nearly $104 per acre. 
Its the transportation that breaks them down; and then to level 
land in any other way than the hydraulic process, as my astute 
friend, Dr. W. L. Graves, suggests, the squirrel and badger 
holes will cause it to fall out of shape so soon as the water would 
be run upon it. This is Nature's plan; all the naturally level 
land you see was leveled by water. This plan is well illus- 
trated on the upper side of the railway track between Niles sta- 
tion and San Jose, where the storm waters last winter came 
down from the hills in torrents, heavily laden with thin mud 
washed from the sides of the hills, and deposited it on the upper 
side of the railroad levees, leaving acres of land as level as a 
house floor on the subsidence of the waters. I think, with this 
plan, the land can be leveled at the rate of twenty acres per 
day, with a first-class engine, like No. 33, now in use in New 
York City as a fire-engine, an account of which I read in Pom- 
eroy's Democrat, about eighteen months ago, at a cost of not 
more than $10 an acre. I am certain that it will not cost more 
than that. 

That it is absolutely necessary to prepare almost all land in this 
valley prior to attempting to irrigate it, one has only to make 
the attempt, to find out that it must be done to insure success. 
Now we Lave our four tracts of land on as many different water 



levels, with the three large tracts terraced, each two feet higher 
than the one next below it, with the narrow strip still higher 
than either of the others, with good and substantial levees sur- 
rounding them all, with good and sufficient gates and boxes so 
constructed that water may drop from one level into another 
without endangering the levees or disturbing the level of the 
land, for the reason that the water, in dropping from one level 
to another, drops into a box below sunk a foot or so in the 
ground lower than the level dropped into. Now water turned 
into one corner of the upper level will be made to run to the 
furthest corner on the opposite side, by means of closing the 
gate near by to pass out to next level below, and from there 
diagonally through all four of the levels — thus making the 
water run over the land in a thin sheet a distance of four miles 
to make its escape, and to know that this is the best shape 
possible. Go ask the mountain meadows; and if you should 
happen to pass through some of the many of them this winter 
has camped in, you would think, perhaps, you never knew before 
how luxuriant grass and clover could grow. Say, for instance, 
Grass Valley, Penn Valley and other mountain valleys in Neva- 
da Co. after the dreadful winter of '49, and later years, on the 
head waters of John Day's River, Snake River, Feather River, 
King's River and the San Joaquin. There are mountain mead- 
ows on the head waters of all of them that are the picture of 
wealth and luxuriant beauty. They were used as models; their 
formation studied to obtain this faultless foundation for the 
new agriculture. Whenever, in passing through high mountain 
meadows, or perchance through the low valley lands, and be- 
hold natural meadows of unsurpassed luxurianct^, you can be 
assured that nature . has first prepared the land on which it 
grows with her great leveling machine, water. This founda- 
tion is plainly dictated to us by nature; for in almost all her un- 
usual displays of luxuriant plant growth, she invariably shows 
them up on a similar foundation. 

I do not know if, in my not very lucid description of this pro- 
cess, I have made it understandable to the reader. The great 
trouble in putting it into practice is, that our people know so 
little about irrigation that not more than one in a hundred of 
them know that it is at all necessary to prepare their land be- 
fore attempting to irrigate it; and persons who now control 
land and water together are very anxious to keep that fact con- 
cealed until they can unload. Professor Davidson, a distin- 
guished gentleman to whom California is indebted for much 
valuable information in relation to irrigation and the construe- 



25 

tion of irrigation canals in Egypt, India, and elsewhere, stated, 
in a paper read by him before the Academy of Sciences lately, 
"That in the southern part of the great valley of California 
land is dear at a dollar an acre. Put water upon it, marry the 
land and the water, and you know that the farmer would hold 
it at $50 per acre. If the professor will come out to the King's 
River country he can find considerable land that has been "mar- 
ried to the water^' for twenty years that he can buy for less 
than ten dollars an acre. Why, new land in the great Mussell 
Slough country, well set in afalfa, could have been, last fall, and 
doubtless can yet be, bought for $40 per acre, with water right 
thrown in; and that in one of the most favored localities in Cali- 
fornia. But in regard to the process above referred to, the result 
of the experiences of this winter, after having made a special- 
ty of such matters for so long, and had unusual facilities for 
collecting information on these subjects, is, that that is the 
shape that land must be put in to irrigate to perfection and con- 
sequent profit, and that that is the process to put it in shape. 

When I first began to study on this process for preparing 
land, I had an intense hatred for land monopoly; I thought it the 
embodiment of evil; the worst enemy of the laboring classes; a 
foe to liberty and progress; a relic of feudalism. I thought the 
Hon. Jno. M. Days, of Nevada Co., drew a flattering picture of 
it, when, in a speech in the California Legislature, about four 
years ago, he said, in substance, "that hoodlumism, intemper- 
ance, prostitution, burglary and murder were individually and 
collectively bad, but that they all paled into insignificance 
alongside of land monopoly, for it was the parent of all of them. 
Now a person only has to see what I have seen and feel what I 
have felt, to know the truth of this ; and when I had matured 
this plan, and found that it was good, and began to think of the 
probable efiect it would have, without proper reflection I came to 
the conclusion that it would benefit the land monopolists more 
than any one else. Whereupon I was much grieved; I thought 
that God must be yery angry with me, because everything I at- 
tempted to do turned out to humiliate and plague me, and not un- 
til I began this writing, and figured closely on it, that I found out 
it would have a contrary effect from what I first imagined, I 
found that it would not only level the land and put it in shape, 
that with a minimum of expense a maximum of results can be 
obtained, make agriculture one of the most renumerative and 
attractive occupations known to mankind throughout Christen- 
dom, elevate labor, depress shoddyism, furnish a standard 
safe and profitable employment through a judicious system of 



5» 

co-operation for the labor and savings of the industrial and la" 
boring classes, show the California farmers and farmers every- 
where how to restore their exhausted fields, fertilize those that 
are barren and infertile, show our northern brethren how not 
only to raise two crops a year and increase the productive capa- 
city of their land ten fold, but how to ripen potatoes, straw- 
berries and the like, nearly as early as we do in California; 
show how to make the Humboldt Desert bloom like the rose of 
Sharon or the lily of the field; how to turn the Colorado Desert 
into a coffee plantation; how to make the great "rainless desert" 
on the line of the Southern Pacific Railroad, known as the 
"Llano Estacado", or "staked plain," more productive than Mus- 
sell Sluugh. And before, as some scientists foreshadow, men 
will so increase and multiply on the face of the earth that there 
will not be standing room for them; the great deserts of Sahara, 
Gobi and Libyan (in spite of their shifting sands) can be made 
as fertile as the Polders of Holland reclaimed from the Zuyder 
Zee alongside of the new North Sea Canal, which now sell for 
$400 an acre by turning the "overflowing Nilus" on to them 
But what is the best and most important item is, that it will 
furnisli a plank for the land monopolists and Chinamen to walk 
out on, hand in hand, for they are both calculated to degrade 
labor. To show how this will be done, we will have to intro- 
duce 

TEE NEW AGEIOULTTJRE. 

Now comes the new agriculturist to take charge of the three 
hundred and twenty acre tract that we have been watching the 
levelers prepare for scientific irrigation, who proposes to show 
that his predecessors have been superficial, none of wliom ever 
reached a properdepth for a scientific foundation ; that he alone 
has sunk to the bed rock and struck it rich. He thinks if there 
has been any one fact more clearly proven to agriculturists by 
the experience of ages than another, it is, that the higher state 
of cultivation you put your land in the better it pays. The 
most notable illustration of this fact, that has come to his 
knowledge, was an experiment made at Stokes Park, in Eng- 
land, by some intelligent gentleman who had two tracts of land 
of the same number of acres and similar in every respect, set apart 
for cultivation, and a careful account was kept of the money 
and labor expended on each tract. One of the tracts was cul- 
tivated in the best manner possible in the ordinary way, and on 
the other they went to extraordinary expenditure in the erection 
of a large tank, at considerable elevation, and putting up an en- 



27 

gine with force pumps wherewith to force liquid manure up 
into the tank, and from the tack a net work of pipe was laid 
throughoat the field for the purpose of distributing the aforesaid 
liquid raaoure by means of a hose and pipe, with sprinkler at- 
tached ; and after putting in and cultivating crops, sparing no 
pains with either, and after harvesting and disposing of the 
crops, and making a careful estimate of the receipts and expen- 
ditures, the result was that there was double_the net profit re- 
turned from the field upon which the extraordinary expense was 
incurred over the other. This agriculturist thinks this favor- 
able result was obtained through the more judicious distribu- 
tion of fertilizers in one case than the other. He also thinks he 
will be able to show the reader his plan for distributing ma' 
nure, which, if not quite so eflScacious as the one described, it will, 
undoubtedly, come nearer to it than any other plan possible to 
devise, and the cost will be merely nominal, as it will be accom- 
plished by taking advantage of the law of gravitation. He 
will now undertake to build this field up into the highest state 
of fertility known to agriculture, and confidently expects that 
within three years be will have so fertilized it (heavily cropping 
it the while) that its productive capacity will have increased ten 
fold over its former average production ; or, in other words, to 
make each one of these one hundred acre tracts to pi'odnce as 
much as one thousand acres of the land adjoining it, farmed in 
the ordinary way. But to do this he expects to use more capi- 
tal and labor, but no corresponding increase of either, however. 

The farmer is strongly imbued with the Egyptian idea of per- 
petuity, and is intensely utilitarian, and will put no improve- 
ment on this land that is not actually necessary; and whatsoever 
improvements he puts upon it will be put there for a purpose, 
and they will be put there in such a substantial manner that 
they will be able to answer that purpose, without straining 
them in the least. 

He believes there is great profit in legitimate farming, if it is 
pursued wisely. He has went to great expense to put these four 
tracts on as many separate water levels, and wants them to remain 
so ; then he will measure off four acres ofi* the south end of the 
narrow strip, or, as we will call it, the upper level, for a garden 
and for trees, vinos and berries. He will throw a levee up 
twelve inches high on the north line of the garden tract ; then 
he will put a box or vat in, right under where the water pours 
out of the district canal into the garden tract, for the water to 
drop into and for the purpose of holding solid manure, but with 
screens or strainers across the outlet so that solid manure will 



28 

not pass out. He will then put up temporary stables and 
dwelling on the upper level north of the garden tract. The 
farm is now in shape to irrigate to perfection. His teams have 
been engaged in hauling manure from the nearest livery stables 
and sheep corrals for the last month and banking it up near 
where the water will drop into the vat above mentioned ; then 
he will turn on the water from the district canal about teu feet 
per second, which will di'op with considerable force into the vat 
that will be kept filled with manure, thereby grinding it up and 
converting into a liquid state ; from thence the water will pass 
out through and over the garden tract, and dropping from thence 
through the open gate into the southwest corner of the second 
level ; and after spreading out over that level and running in a 
broad shallow stream 1,100 feet wide and about one inch deep, 
about 2,640 feet in a northerly direction, it will drop from this 
level through the open gate into the northwest corner of the 
third level, and from thence it turns back and runs south in the 
same broad and shallow stream to the open gate at the south 
end of this level and drops from thence through the open gate 
into the fourth or lowest level, and from thence it will tnrn and 
run north in the same broad and shallow stream to the open 
gate in the northeast corner of this level, where it will finally 
pass ofi" this land, thus compelling the water, heavily laden with 
manure, to pass in a thin sheet over the whole of liis ' land in- 
tended for cultivation. (This is a very good* way i'ov distribu- 
ting manure, but he intends to decidedly improve on this plan.) 
The perfection of irrigation consists in a thin sheet of water 
passing over laud. This he now has. He begins to fertilize. 
During the reign of Napoleon III. that monarch commissioned 
a number of French savans to ascertain and report t6 him what 
were the best fertilizers. After a great deal of resLarch, they 
answered'that "slime from rivers" was the best. It is a well 
known fact to scientists that water, when passing over land in 
a thin sheet, like this new agriculturist has it, has the quality of 
depositing in the land so passed over all the ingredients it 
holds in solution favorable to plant life, and of extracting 
therefrom all the ingredients inimical to plant life. Now it 
seems to me that the knowledge of the fact of water having the 
extremely happy qualities above mentioned plainly tells us 
that Nature, in her economy, intended that water should be so 
utilized in all agricultural enterprises and in all climates. He 
will let the water run in this manner for a couple of weeks ; 
then, supposing it to be the first of November, he will shut off 
^•he water and let the ground get sufficiently dry for proper cul- 



29 

tivation. (For he thinks if there are two men who will event- 
tially bring up in a very warm climate, it will be the black- 
smith that hammers cold iron and the farmer that plows wet 
land.) Then he will pnrchase a sufficient quantity of the best 
seed wheat in" the market to seed these three levels, without 
plowing the land (mind you). He plants his wheat by drilling it 
in rows about eighteen inches apart. After the wheat is planted 
he puts his teams to foraging around the country for more ma- 
nure, and has them to bank it up near the vat above mentioned. 
About the middle of March his wheat will have attained the, height 
of three feet, which he cuts for hay. (When he has hay to cut 
he always has it carefully spread out so soon as it is cut, so as 
it will cure readily, and then uses all possible despatch to have 
it in the stack as soon as possible.) So soon as the hay is off 
the ground, the water, laden with manure, will be sent on to 
land, as before, and is continued to run night and day for forty- 
eight hours. The waters at this season of the year generally 
hold much fertility in solution, as the rivers are often bank full 
at this time. When the water is turned off and the ground is 
in proper tilth, he will run cultivators between the rows, and 
cultivate the ground thoroughly ; then he will cultivate it cross- 
wise of the rows, tearing up one-half of the wheat plants. He 
will carefully train his horses that they will not step on the rows 
of grain. When harvest comes on he will confidently expect to 
harvest at least seventy bushels to the acre, or 21,000 bushels 
of grain from the three levels. In the meantime he has in no 
wise neglected the four acres set apart for a garden ; and by 
means of having it on a water level he has been enabled, through 
making his plant beds the full length of the garden tract, to cul- 
tivate it as well and thoroughly with his horses, plows and cul- 
tivators as Chinamen could do with their shovels and hoes. (Thus 
substituting the horse for the Chinaman . ) He has used one- 
half of it for trees and vines, and the balance for vegetables. 
Let ns now see what show there is for profit on this crop. We 
will first ascertain the probable expense, to wit: Hauling ma- 
nure, $1,000; seed, $300; planting, $300; harvesting hay, $600; 
cultivating grain, $300 ; heading grain, $500 ; threshing 21,- 
000 bushels, at 74 cents per bushel, $1,410 ; sacks, $1,600. 
Total expense, $6,0*10. Then we will count up the receipts, 
which will be: 21,000 bushels of grain, at $1 40 per cental, or 
84 cents per bnshel, $17,640 ; 450 tons of hay, at $5 per ton, 
$2,250; which, added to amount received for wheat, would equal 
$19,890, from which deduct $6,070, will leave $18,820 net profit. 
Now to raise crops like that this man expects, although the 



30 

water in the spring of the year when the rivers are in lull flood 
are very fertilizing, it will in no wise compensate for the large 
crops here desired and confidently expected, as the water, when 
it runs over land, as it does here, has such a wonderful stimula- 
ting effect on the growth of plants that an immense amount of 
manure will be required to sustain such extraordinary draughts 
upon it as it is calculated here. So soon as one crop is har- 
vested another one will be put in ; and as this agriculturist ex- 
pects to draw upon this land every time he harvests a crop, to 
the fullest extent of its capacity, and at the same time to in- 
crease its productive capacity very perceptibly every time he 
crops it, he, of course, understands that the fertilizing prob- 
lem must be solved. He thinks, perhaps, that diversified farm- 
iug will be the nearest road of this difficulty. He concludes, 
perhaps, here is a good opening for a large dairy, for the pur- 
pose of making butter, and feeding the sour milk to pigs. Then 
there will be a great deal of preparation to make, and consider- 
able skill, labor and money required. Much that will have to 
be done at the same time in the line of building stables and appur- 
tenances, planting the entire second level in alfalfa, and the 
third and fourth levels for a second crop in corn and pumpkins, 
and the purchase of cattle, horses and hogs, he has, as we 
have seen, cleared $13,000 and over off the crop of wheat, but 
that will not more than furnish half enough capital to put this 
farm in shape that the highest percentage can be made out of 
the investment. So the shareholders may expect to pay assess- 
ments pretty lively for a few months. He expects of the hun- 
dred acres of alfalfa, and what feed he will be able to save off of 
one of the two lower levels (for he expects to devote one of 
the lower levels alternately to some staple crop, such as Sea 
Island cotton, tobacco, rice, or whatever staple he may think 
there's the most money in), to carry four hundred head of milch 
cows, and to turn off for market 2,000 pigs, weighing 200 
pounds each, at least. One of the first things he will do will 
be to build a wall of masonry along the line dividing the up- 
per and second level, said wall to be just as high as the surface 
of the upper level. Then he will employ an experienced architect 
and builder for the purpose of drawing up a plan and the build- 
ing of a stable for the 400 cows and about eighteen head of 
horses; also, a piggery. The buildings to be located with partic- 
ular regard to feeding the alfalfa which will grow on the sec- 
ond level to the different kinds of stock. He will locate the 
stable asfollows (the stable to be 700 feet long and 40 feet wide, 
walls 12 feet high, with gable roof) : commencing at the north 



31 

end of the upper level, running south 700 feet for quantity, 
leaving a strip twenty feet wide on the edge of the wall that 
divides the upper from the second level. 

The next thing to be done, after laying off this strip of ground 
will be to dig a trench down the middle of it large enough to 
put in a plank sewer six feet wide and four feet deep in the. 
clear; said sewer to be full length of the stable, and water tight. 
After the sewer is put in the dirt that came out of the ex- 
cavation is carefully spread out over the balance of the surface 
of the strip, which will raise the surface of the ground from 
four to six inches. Then a tight floor of two inch plank, like 
the deck of a ship, will be laid over the whole surface of the 
ground laid out for a stable. An aperture will be left in the 
floor about one foot wide, immediately over the middle of the 
sewer, but so arranged as to be covered with a ten inch plank 
that can be easily raised up. The object of the tight floor and 
sewer is to save every particle of liquid and solid manure, as it 
has been clearly proven that the liquid excrement from animals 
is as valuable for fertilizing as the solid. This large sewer will 
be connected with the third and fourth level by small sewers 
made of redwood plank twelve inches wide and twelve inches 
deep in the clear, and to pass under the respective levels; the 
tops of said sewers to be fourteen inches below the surface of 
the levels passed tinder; said sewers to be put in position be- 
fore the land is leveled; so arranged that water sent on to the 
fields may be made to pass through the large sewer under the 
stable when desired, and to convey the manure in a liquid state 
on to either of the two lower levels. Then he will take out the 
boxes and gates that were ten feet wide, that were placed in 
each end of the levees on the lower side of each of the three 
large levels, and carefully replace the dirt that was excavated 
for the purpose of putting in those boxes, and put in one sub- 
stantial box, to be six feet wide in the middle of each of these 
levees, with gates in each end of said boxes. The small sewer 
connecting the large sewer under the stable with the third and 
fourth levels will be made to open out iu these boxes. Then he 
will place covered sewers perforated with inch holes on the 
lower side of each of these levees, to be six inches wide and 
twelve inches deep, to be sunk one-half of their depth below 
the surface of the levels to be watered by them, and be made to 
connect with or issue out of either side of these boxes, to run the 
whole length of the levees ; but to be closed at the end furthest 
from the boxes. Then when he wants to run sewage water 
on to the third level, he will close the mouth of the sewer that 



32 

conducts water into the fourth level ; also the gates on the up- 
per and lower side of the box, and the sewage water will be 
forced into the side sewers that are perforated with holeg 
with considerable pressure, providing there is a big head of 
water turned on. When the fourth level is to be sewaged, the 
opening admitting sewage water out of the box into those per- 
forated side sewers are to be closed, and the mouth of the sewer 
that conducts water on to the fourth level is to be opened, and 
the sewage water will be allowed to pass down to a similar 
box in the levee below, when everything will be arranged in 
the same manner. This is the most simple and eflScient manner 
for the distribution of sewage fertilizers that it is possible to im- 
agine; I think very nearly as good as that described in Stokes' 
Park, England, and this by the simple law of gravitation; the 
cost of which will be merely nominal. But he will return to 
work on the stable. Now he has a substantial and water-tight 
sewer and a water-tight floor laid over the whole ground laid 
out for the stable. He will now put up two rows of mangers 
throughout the whole length of the stable, ten feet from either 
wall, leaving a space in the middle twenty feet wide; but pas- 
sage ways will be left every one hundred and twenty feet. It 
is calcuiated that a row of cows will stand on each side of 
these mangers, and two rows of cows feed out of one man_ 
ger. At each of the openings above referred to small corrals, 
100x120 feet each, are to be made, with water troughs in them, 
so that the cows may go out into them each day for water and 
exercise. By leaving an opening every one hundred and 
twenty feet will allow for eighty head of cows between each 
opening. Then he will build the stable on this foundation of 
the dimensions above described, but the timber supporting the 
middle of the stable must be very substantial, as he intends 
running a train of cars on the second floor; not by any means 
as heavy as ordinary R. R. cars. He will now lay down an 
upper floor in the stable full length, just high enough above the 
lower one for the health and comfort of the cows, about nine 
feet. 

He will now measure off a tract of land for a haystack, to 
wit: commencing twenty feet south of the stable and running 
south along the edge of the upper level 500 feet long, 35 feet 
wide, being right on the upper edge of the Alfalfa tract — sp.ace 
enough, by stacking it sixty feet high, to contain 1500 tons of 
hay. He will now commence and lay down a railway track 
Commencing at the north end of the cow stable on the upper 
floor, and lay it down through the middle of it to the south end; 



33 

and from thence continuing it along on trestle work alongside of 
the ground set apart for a haystack. The track to be one foot 
higher at the southern than at its uorthern terminus; to be 
somewhat similar to those used by miners in tunneling in the 
mountains. Track to be six feet wide, wooden rails strapped 
with iron. Platform cars with stations to keep the hay on. 
The four hundred and fifty tons of wheat hay, so soon as it was 
cut, was put into a stack, the upper end of which was located at 
the upper end of this ground above described as set apart for a 
haystack. It covered a space of 35 feet wide by 150 feet long, 
and was 60 feet high. The idea of stacking hay sixty feet high 
he learned of those clear-headed gentlemen who have done so 
much for legitimate agriculture in California, Messrs. Haggin 
and Carr, of Kern Co. ; the idea he thinks an excellent one in 
many respects. It can be protected from the weather mucli 
cheaper in that way than by putting it iuto barns, andis much 
cheaper put into stacks than barns. Now by putting on this 
track ten or twelve platform cars, as above described, it will be 
seen that he has placed his hay in such manner as to be able to 
feed it to his animals at small 3ost, as most of the hay is above 
the track, and as it takes much less force to move heavy bodies 
down than up, he has his hay at great advantage by availing 
himself of the law of gravitation. And when tiie cars are 
loaded with hay, they are transported ou a down grade to any 
portion of the stable; and by having an opening left on each 
side of the track in the upper floor, right above the mangers, 
they can be easily filled with hay by tumbling it oiF the cars (m 
either side. 

Now the vacant strip of land twenty feet wide that was left 
between the stable and the wall of the upper level, he will pre- 
pare as follows, for a piggery: The first thing to be done is to 
put in a sewer eighteen inches deep and five feet wide right 
down the center and full length, and parallel with the large 
stable; the top of the sewer will be level with the surface of the 
ground; then he will make tight floors on each side, of two inch 
plank, the floors to slant towards the sewer to slant enough 
that water will run off the floors from both sides into the sewer. 
Then fill the sewer one-half full with pebbles the size of hens' 
eggs; then put a shed roof over the whole of this floor, and 
board up the sides all round just high enough to keep the pigs 
inside; then put in a long trough on the side furthest from the 
main building. Said trough to be connected by a small flume 
with the milk-house, which will be located just south of the 



34 

haystack. A manger will be erected over the trough, into 

which alfalfa will be thrown from the field that adjoins it. 

Whilst the builders were at work on the stable, piggery and 
appurtenances, the farmer has been busily engaged in prepar- 
ing the three levels, and putting in alfalfa and corn, to wit: he 
took the stubble land, su soon as the grain was out of the fields, 
said stubble having been loft standing about three feet high, 
and launched on a big head of water laden with manure, aa 
aforetime, and let it run until the ground was thoroughly 
soaked. Then so soon as the ground was sufficiently dry to ad- 
ipjt his teams on to it, he put his reapers to work, and had the 
stubble cut oflF as close to the ground as possible, the swatha 
laid crosswi.se of their loveLs; then plowed the land one foot 
deep, the furr jws running crosswise of the levels, the same as 
the swaths were laid. The swaths of atabble he had carefully 
deposited in every third or fourtli furi'jw, and had them con- 
nected on the lower side of each level with a furrow also filled 
with a swath of the stubble, great care being taken to lay the 
stalks lengthwise of tiie furrows, and to see that they are care- 
fully covered with the next round of the plow as deep as possi- 
ble — his intention being to make those furrows thus filled with 
wheat stalks to serve as conduits for water and as tile drains, 
and for facilitating the irrigation of his corn without having to 
ran the water over the top of the ground. He thinks the water 
may be made to follow these furrows filled with wheat stalks 
under ground, and is confident the ground will saturate the 
short distance between the furrows. The drain so improved 
will thus be made to connect throughout each level, and to con- 
nect with an aperture to be arranged in the boxes that connect 
the respective levels so as to drain the land^ and then he will 
have both irrigation and drainage. He will so utilize his stub- 
ble in all subsequent crops. It's true, these dairies will not be en- 
daring, from the fact that the ground will be kept continually 
moist, and the stubble will soon decompose; and for fertilizers 
these drains will then be worth all the cost, and can be readily 
replaced. When plowing ground, he will always have the 
harrow follow close to the plow, and pulverize the ground thor- 
oughly; for in this artificial use of water, although he will be 
careful not to plow his ground until it is in proper tilth, it is 
liable to break and become like dobies if this precaution is not 
regarded. He believes, in the raising of any crop, that the 
most important part of the battle is to come off in the putting 
of it in, in the best possible manner; therefore in that he will 
spare no labor, and, before putting in any crop, he will endeavor 



35 

to reduce it to the consistency of a well ordered plant bed, and 
then with judicious watering in most cases he thinks he will 
have done his duty. But he will always, if possible, cultivate 
land after running water over the surface of it, without it hap- 
pens to be meadow land. Now in this manner he has planted 
the second level, the one next to the stable and piggery, and 
the stacking ground being laid olf right alongside of it, in his 
most important crop, alfalfa; and as it will probably produce 
more weight of vegetation than either of the three large levels, 
he therefore plants it close to where it will be fed out. The 
third and fourth levels he has planted in corn and pumpkins for 
a second crop. From this one hundred acres in alfalfa, thus 
put in, and the remarkably clever manner in which be intends 
feeding it, he expects prodigious results from it. Now with 
the four hundred and fifty tons of hay he has in the stack, and 
having a lai'ge amount of feed in prospective so soon as his al- 
falfa gets in full bearing, and the two hundred acres he has in 
corn, he thinks he is prepared for the reception and care of con- 
siderable stock. He really wants four hundred head of cows, 
but they are not to be purchased in so large numbers readily in 
the market; consequently, he will go around to the California 
dairies and purchase 1,000 bead of young cattle of both sexes, 
and as he will have to wait sometime on their growth, he 
thinks he will purchase enough to pay him for waiting, and 
that by this means he thinks he will make profit enough to iiave 
his amount clear. They are about one year old, and he pays 
ten dollars per head; the best stock of ordinary cattle he can 
find. He has plenty of room in his large stable, and the corrals 
attached for their accommodation. When his corn gets ripe he 
will also purchase about five hundred head of the best stock 
hogs he can find, as wheu he gets fairly started in the dairy 
business be will want to keep constantly about two hundred 
fine brood sows. He will also purchase eight fine young bulls 
and eight fine heifers, for which he will have to pay about $500 
apiece for the former and $250 each for the latter. He will 
also purchase six fine young boars for $50 each. It will be 
seen that the piggery is admirably located in regard to feeding 
the alfalfa to the pigs, as it is immediately on the edge of it. 
All the manure the alfalfa will be allowed hereafter will be what 
it receives by way of the piggery, which will be supplied to it 
in the following manner: The alfalfa field will be divided as 
follows, to wit: By a line drawn from the south end of the long 
stable at right angles with it to the levee on the lower side of 
the second level, including all north of that line, which will be 



36 

twenty-eight acres, to be divided by a string of six (6) inch 
plank sunk in the ground edgewise to act as a levee, leaving 
seventy-two acres south of that line. Now a covered, sewer, 
six inches deep and four inches wide, to be placed along close 
to the wall in front of the piggery, sunk one-half of its depth in 
the ground the whole length of the building, to be perforated 
with one-half inch holes, six inches apart on the side next the 
alfalfa; the sewer to be closed at both ends, and to be con- 
nected with the large sewer in the middle of the piggery, by a 
large wooden pipe. Another sewer of the same description, 
and connected with the large sewer in the piggery in the same 
manner, to be placed in front of the wall facing the seventy- 
two acre tract; then so much water to be kept flowing into the 
largo sewer in the piggery constantly, as can be forced through 
these small sewers that are perforated with the one-half inch 
hole ; the pressure being about eighteen inches. 

Now, when this farmer has his stock of hogs up to about 
1500 head, the amount he expects, generally to keep on hand* 
and these hogs fed all they can eat of the most nourishing and 
palatable food for swine, he will naturally think that there 
will be sewage matter enough to keep this alfalfa field, the sur- 
face of which is as smooth and level as a house floor, with said 
sewage water perculating all over it, in the highest possible 
state of fertility. The hog-master will be required every day 
to wash down the floor of the piggery with a hose until it is per- 
fectly clean; washing the filth into the main sewer, which will 
be kept well stirred by the hogs wallowing in it. After keep- 
ing the 1000 head of young cattle for one year in the best man- 
ner possible, the farmer will sell about six hundred head of 
them, reserving four Imndred head of two year old cows, which 
is considered the proper age, by the best authority in the coun- 
try, for cows to come into milk. We will offer in evidence an 
article taken from the Fresno Exjyositor, which this writer 
thinks is the pink of philosopliy, and concurs with the editor of 
the above paper when he enjoins all farmers to study it. 

EDUCATION OF DAIRY COWS. 



Mr. X. A. Willard, daily editorof the Bural New Yorker, and 
a writer of practical force and scientific authority on all dairy 
subjects, in a late issue of that journal has the following sensi- 
ble hints on educating dairy cows, which should be studied by 
all farmers and dairymen. He says: "The education of the ani- 
mal for the dairy is of prime importance. Docility, good tem- 
per, quietness, all of which are necessary in a good milch cow, 



37 

are the results, in a great measure, of kind treatment and early 
education. Many a fine animal has been irreparably ruined by 
coarse and brutal treatment, for no cow that trembles from 
fright or exhibits great nervousness during milking will yield 
her greatest capacit}' for milk. Calves, from the first, should 
be fondled and made familiar with persons; never frightened or 
worried by dogs, beaten or cruf^lly treated; they should have no 
fear of their attendants, but rather express pleasure in their 
presence and a willingness to be petted and handled; the utmost 
kindness and tenderness should be shown in her management un- 
til the animal is thoroughly broken and shows no more nervous- 
ness at being milked than in the suckling of her own calf. Heif- 
ers that have been well kept will begin to come in milk at two 
years of age, and are regarded as making better cows than when 
comingin milk at a later age, since the capacity for giving milk 
is varied by habit, and an early development in this regard stim- 
ulates the secretion of milk, and, as found by experience, is 
productive of better results. — Expositor, Fresno. 

The 600 head of cattle, after having been kept as above stated 
in the best manner possible, the farmer cao dispose of them for 
beef, and counting on them weighing at least 600 pounds each, 
and at six cents per pound on foot, will be $36 per head, and 
600x$36 will amount to $21^600, or equivalent to getting his 
400 head of cows for nothing and over $900 per month for 
keeping them, for which he has raised ample food off the 100 
acres in alfalfa and off the third and fourth levels in corn and 
pumpkins. With 400 cows giving milk, and a full complement 
of stock hogs, with a milk-house large enough for a dairy of 
that size, and with a commodious dwelling capable of comforta- 
bly boarding and lodging about forty persons, and a garden and 
orchard in which he prides himself, the farmer thinks he is 
prepared now to go into the dairy business, and also to indulge 
himself in the waj' of some legitimate farming. The milk-house 
will be located immediately south of the ground set apart for a 
haystack, the walls of which will be 3 feet thick; the railway 
will be extended through the upper portion of it, so as the 
milkers can transport themselves with their milk to and from 
the dairy. But there will be a flume connecting the milk-house 
and the piggery, so that the sour milk and slops from the kitchen 
will run to the pig-trough of its own volition. Then the dwell- 
ing will join the milk-house on the south. There will be 32 per- 
sons required to operate this farm, notwithstanding everything 
in the way of buildings and appurtenances have been most skill- 
fully located in regard to economy of labor; it will require of 
each and every one of these employees a most efficient, active 
and cheerful performance of the duties assigned them, to work 
the farm up to its full capacity; and as the farmer expects the 



highest character of service from his employees, he will spare 

Ho pains to add to their efficiency; their moral, mental, physical 
and social well-bein^ will be carefully guarded, they will live 
upon the fat of the land — much of it, however, the product of 
the farm. His idea will be to have every person and every ani- 
mal under his care in condition for the highest enjoyment of 
life, his employees will be made to feel at home, and to feel that 
they had rather be there than elsewhere; wages $30 per month, 
payable quarterly. There will be required about 20 young men 
and women for the dairy, the sexes equally divided, and about 
12 other persons, including a superintendent and three other 
persons employed in the kitchen and dining rooms. The culi- 
nary department on this farm will receive particular attention. 

Bath rooms will be provided, and the employees will be ex- 
pected to avail themselves of them. The labors of the day will 
be brought to a close by 6.30 p. m., if not earlier; he don't like 
to see his people eternally drudging, but when they work to 
work with their might; he looks upon them as rational and 
social beings, therefore he will have a large, commodious, well 
lighted and ventilated room, in which they can all meet for two 
or three hours' social enjoyment, he will 'also have a well ap- 
pointed library and plenty of newspapers. He thinks if he 
provides plenty of nutritious food and good beds for his horses 
and cattle, that is sufficient fur all purposes, but thinks the hu' 
man animal must have more. Now I think the intelligent 
reader has a good idea of how this farmer went to work to put 
his farm in proper shape, and his mode of acquiring dairy stock 
and pigs, and his mode of supplying himself with fertilizers, 
and his mode of distributing the same, in the shape of sewer- 
age, by means of sewers, some of which he calls side sewers, 
that run along the upper side of each level, and perforated with 
inch holes close together; and now, after he has everj'thing in 
readiness for business he will endeavor to give the reader an 
idea as briefly as possible how he will operate his farm, and also 
endeavor to show what chance for profit there is in this new agri"- 
culture. He has his second level now in full bearing of alfalfa, 
with sewage constantly percolating over it, except when neces. 
sarily shut off so as to harvest the crop, which he expects to 
cut every twenty days in the summer-time, feeding as much of 
it green to his cattle and pigs as possible; in fact the pigs will 
have it cut green for them every day, but will feed it green to 
•his cows only while harvesting his crop, save in the winter sea- 
son, when hay cannot be cured — he will then cut and feed it green 
to all his stock. He will, under no consideration, allow stock 



39 

to run loose over his fields. On this farm it t^ill be either 
seed-time or harvest constantly, and the superintendent's head 
will have to be as level as the land he cultivates; he will have 
to keep his decks constantly cleared for actiou; he will require 
about twelve fine horses, and when a crop is to be put in or 
harvested everything will have to be in the best order possible. 
He will keep all the stock he can furnish plenty of feed for, but 
not one more. When the alfalfa is cut, and so soon as it can be 
cured, it will be put into large cocks and dragged up alongside 
of the stack, and the large derrick forks will reach down for it 
and hoist it on to the stack, thus making the cost of handling it 
as little as possible. He thinks it very important that hay 
should not be allowed to remain in the field and bleach a mo- 
ment longer than is actually necessary. 

The third and fourth levels, as before stated, -will alternately be 
Tised for some staple crop, whilst the other one will be put in 
wheat first, and so soon as the grain is headed and the heads put 
into a large bin, the sewage water will be sent on to the stubble 
with all pressure, and as much sewage will be forced through 
these perforated side sewers as possible ; then, so soon as the 
ground is thoroughly saturated with sewage water, it will be 
shut ofi'and the stubble ground allowed to dry. Then he will the 
have stubbla reaped close to the ground crosswise of the level; 
then, as before stated, the ground plowed one foot deep, the swath 
of stubble carefully deposited in the furrow and connected 
throughout the whole level and with the drain in to the box, 
and as fast as the ground is plowed and reduced to the consist- 
ency of a plant bed the corn and pumpkins are to be planted. 
Then to water this corn so soon as it is planted he will keep 
constantly running through these sewers and into the corn field 
just what water these furrows, filled with straw, will abs(jrb, 
tintil the corn will be in roasting ear. Then he will shut off the 
water entirely and let the corn and pumpkins get ripe. This 
farmer does not believe in eternally dabbling in the water, and 
thinks that there is such a thing as overdoing the thing in the 
way of stimulating the plant growth with water ; and thinks 
there is no danger of overstimulating until such time as corn 
gets in roasting ear, cotton in the boll or wheat in the ear, but 
at that period he thinks it should be shut ofiF. He thinks by 
using so much manure that it has such a heating influence on 
the soil so that crops will ripen at least two weeks sooner than 
they would without the manure, and for this reason he thinks 
by using the utmost celerity in planting and harvesting that he 
has ample time, in this climate, for raising five crops in one 



40 

year, to wit: One crop of wheat hay, one crop of wheat, one 
crop of corn, one crop of corn fodder, and last, though by no 
means least, a crop of pumpkins. 

By giving these two lower levels all the manure from the 
large stable and the water-closets from the dwelling house, and 
that distributed to them in the shape of sewage, as heretofore 
described, and the land being cultivated like a garden (which 
the farmer can do with his teams and implements, by reason of 
having his ground on a water level"i, he will have what sOme 
people might think "great expectations" in regard to the 
amount of produce he will harvest from one acre of land in one 
year. This will be as* follows, to wit: Two tons of wheat hay, 
one hundred bushels of wheat, one hundred bushels of corn, 
three tons of corn fodder, and five tons of pumpkins. This may 
seem monstrous to those people who are not posted as to the 
effect that sewage has on land. In reference to that I v^ill in- 
troduce some English authority of the highest order. The well 
known English agriculturist, J. J. Mecchi, in a letter to the 
Mark Lane Express, extracts of which appeared in the N. Y. 
Sun lately, in which that gentleman said, "I would say to those 
who speak lightly of the value of sewage, how is it that land 
worth to rent some $5 per acre, very quickly, when sewaged, 
increased in value from 100 to 400 per cent. .-' Witness Croy- 
don and other places. How is it that the once worthless Edin- 
burgh sewaged meadows are now let by public auction annu- 
ally at prices varying up to $220 an acre — the average, T be- 
lieve, being $120 an acre for the six months' occupation and 
crop?" But before we proceed any further in this direction, let 
us see what kind of an investment this kind of farming promises 
to be. We will first make a rough estimate of what amount of 
capital it will take to equip one of these kinds of farms. 

For the first item let us find the cost of 320 acres of land and 

the water right $ 3,200 00 

Cost of preparing land 5,000 00 

Building and appurtenances 20,000 00 

400 cows, at $36 per head 14,400 00 

Twelve head of horses and harness 3,000 00 

Two large wagons 500 00 

Two light " .... 400 00 

Furniture for dwelling 3,000 00 

" " kitchen 1,500 00 

Farming implements 2,500 00 

Eight fine young bulls, $500 each 4,000 00 

" « " heifers, $250 " 2,000 00 

200 brood sows, at $15 each 3,000 00 



41 

One-half dozen fine young boars, at $50 each 300 00 

Sundries 3,000 00 



Total amount of outfit $65,800 00 

Now for expenses for one year, to wit: 
Cost of labor for thirty-one employees for twelve 

months, at $30 each per month $11,160 00 

Board and lodging per month for thirty-two per- 
sons, at $20 per month each, will be $640 per 

month, and for twelve months 7,680 00 

Superintendent 1,800 00 

Insurance 1,000 00 

Railroad freight 4,000 00 

Grain sacks 750 00 

Water rates 200 00 

Seed wheat 300 00 

Mechanical work 1,500 00 

Incidental expenses 4,934 00 

Total amount for expenses for one year $33,324 00 

Now for the gross proceeds for one year, to wit: 

Twenty-five pounds nice yellow butter per mouth 

from each cow, at twenty-five cents per pound, 

$6 25 per month from each cow, and for twelve 

months would be $15 each, and for 400 cows $30,000 00 

10,000 bushels wheat, at $1 65 per cental 9,900 00 

2,000 pigs, weighing 200 pounds each at 6^ cents 

per pound . . T 26,000 00 

Amount received from lower level in some staple 

product 10,000 00 

400 calves, at $l0 each 4,000 00 

Four fine- blooded bull calves, at $200 each 800 00 

Total amount of gross proceeds for one year $80,700 00 

And from the gross proceeds for one year $80,700 00 

Let us deduct total amount of expenses for one 
year $33,324 00 

Will leave a clear profit for one year of $47,376 00 

or six per cent, per month. 

If this showing will not make agriculture attractive, this 
writer will be at a loss to know what will; and if the intelligent 
reader is not convinced of it, tiie writer is certain that it is on 
account of his lack of descriptive ability. For he is satisfied 
that what he has here attempted to explain is the perfection of 
simple, plain, practical agriculture. He has no doubt that, 
in some of the details, vast improvements can and will be made. 
But in the important matters, such as the preparation of the 
land, location of buildings and appurtenances, and in the mode 
of saving and distributing the fertilizers, he thinks he has left 



42 

no room for improvement^ and would suggest to those who 
deviate from the directions here laid down, that they will be 
departing just so far from the most direct road. He has 
given no directions but what are absolutely necessary — has 
spoken no idle word intentionally. Some may think having 
stubble i*eaped, and using them and the pumpkin vines for the 
purpose of irrigation and drainage, and afterwards as fertilizers, 
excessive labor; but I say to you that the more intelligent and 
well-directed labor you put upon an acre of land, the higher 
will be the percentage you will make off of your capital and 
labor. 

My idea is that it is " profit" that wise men should labor for. 
It's true, it requires considerable capital to follow the directions 
here laid down; but if one will but notice capitalists (and they 
should be good authority in such matters), they seem to be 
pleased to get to place their money in largely, when, by so do- 
ing they can increase their percentage. 

There is certainly no breach of economy in any directions 
here laid down. Most certainly not in the sewage system; for 
through that the farmer gets as good a distribution of his fer- 
tilizers as though he had two hundred Chinamen employed at 
$20 per month each, fur that purpose, all of which he has, by 
investing, permanently, about $5000. Most certainly not by 
sparing no expense for the comfort, health and enjoyment of his 
employees. Not by feeding his animals all they can eat on the 
fat of the land. Not by plowing his land one foot deep, for the 
simple purpose of burying his stubble and pumpkin vines for 
the purposes of irrigation and drainage, and afterwards, when 
di'composed, for excellent fertilizers. Not by cultivating his 
large fields until thej- are the consistency of an Italian or China 
garden, which he does with his powerful and well-bred horses, 
and with the best of farming implements, as well as natives of 
those countries can do it with their hand implements; and, of 
all things, he has committed no breach of economy by having 
his land leveled, for that is the foundation upon whicli this sys- 
tem (which is but another name for economy) rests. This sys- 
tem economizes to the enormous extent of eighty per cent, in 
almost everything. It was the intention of the author of this 
system to place agriculture on a firm, enduring and faultless 
foundation, on which it could run in the even tenor of its way 
without any more innovation, throughout all the coming ages, 
till 

"The treasures of nature's german tomble all together 
Even till destruction sickens," 



^3 

And hopes that, throuf^h a judicious system of co-operation, it will 
inure to the benefit of the industrial and laboring classes more 
than to any other. When this new agriculture gets fairly in- 
augurated it will present the best opening for young persons 
to lay the foundation of a competency that has heretofore been 
known, as it is now entirely an untrodden field, and there is 
but a small portion of the cultivatable area of this planet that is 
not susceptible of this style of agriculture. Through a judicious 
system of co-operation employcies on these kind of farms can 
if they choose, invest their savings, which can be done through- 
out this generation so as to return not less than five per cent, 
per month dividends, which, on becoming generally known, will 
be a great inducement for laboring people to be industrious aud 
economical. Say, for instance, there are thirty employees on 
tills farm, getting thirty dollars per month wages, ten dollars of 
this will keep them comfortably clothed, and pay all their neces- 
sary expenses, leaving them twenty dollars per month each for 
investment; which will amount to six hundred dollars per 
month, aud perhaps there will be an equal number of employ- 
ees on an adjoining farm, who will be able to save up an equal 
amount, which would equal $1200 per month, and by coopera- 
tion these employees can have the great benefit of a combination 
of capital, skill, labor and experience, which, coupled with hon- 
est and efficient management, will be as certain to Command 
eminent financial success as that the night follows the day. 

The inauguration of this system of agriculture, while it ele- 
vates labor, will lower the price of land — nearly lower it out of 
sight. The land monopolist's occupation will be gone; for 
say for instance there are nine million acres of land in the great 
valley of California, and we have seen people for the last twen- 
ty years making tremendous but unsuccessful efforts to make 
farming successful and profitable by cultivating one-half of it, or 
4^ million acres, and the result is that about half of the farmers 
are flat broke, their land mortgaged, and their fields much ex- 
hausted. Now I think it has been conclusively shown that the 
new agriculturists can come in and cultivate one-tenth of the 
4^ million acres or 450 thousand acres and raise more produce 
off of it than was raised off the 4^ million acres, and make it the 
most profitable business on this coast, bonanza mining not ex- 
cepted. Under the present system 4 J of the nine million acres 
ard lying idle, but under the new system only one-tenth of 
what has been in use will be required to raise nearly double the 
amount of produce, thereby leaving over 8-^ million acres unem- 
ployed, Which, for grazing purposes, little more than pay the 



44 

taxes, at a low price; therefore of all things there should be no 
dearth of land. 

One very important item in this new business, this system, 
it seems to me, will have a tendency to shrink np and contract 
the area of cultivated land just nine-tenths. 

Our land monopolists at present are weary and heavy laden; 
they are termed land poor, but still they are a wonderful check 
to progress. Land monopoly is not only a curse to those who 
hold it, but a curse to those from whom it is withheld. 

I have often wondered why men representing California in 
the National Legislature did not have the government lands in 
California withdrawn from market, and only to be disposed of 
through homestead and pre-emption laws; it would have been a 
great blessing to the country in general, and the laboring peo- 
ple in particular; but the curse is upon us, that is a melancholy 
fact that cannot be gainsaid. But the position of the large land- 
holders is anything but enviable in most localities; I think it is 
the best property to go short on in the conntry; they have an 
elephant on their hands, and the great leveling machine, so 
soon as it goes to work, will increase his magnitude just ten 
fold, and that is too big a raise for an unnatural and tottering 
institution to stand. It is the sincere hope of the writer that 
but a few years will have elapsed until land and water monopo- 
lists will be known only through tradition. They lie directly 
across the path of progress. 

It seems to me that of all shapes mal-legislatiou, not to say 
corruption, ignorance, incompetency and venality have taken 
in the last seventeen years, the successful attempt to rob the 
American people of their patrimony in the matter of the public 
lands of the United States is the most damning. It almost 
looks as though "legislators," both State and National, had 
joined hand in hand with land grabbers and corruptionists, as 
witness the disposition made of the swamp and overflowed 
lands and the State School lands, the people at large and tht; 
State receiving little or no benefit from them — the actual set- 
tlers in most cases having to pay speculators an advance sel- 
dom less than four or five hundred per cent; and it seems that 
the rapacity of these sharks is on the increase, for in the last 
Congress they succeeded in having that latest iniquity, "The 
Desert Land Bill" passed, "a thing devised by the enemy," a 
scheme whereby a certain old sinner living in San Francisco, 
with a high, narrow forehead, stooping shoulders, protruding 
chin and cadaverous face, a picture of sin and soi'row, the gen- 
ious of land and water monopoly, may gobble up, through the 



45 

odious, dunning system, what remaining land there is in the out- 
skirts of civilization. 

But I am in hopes this kind of business has culminated with 
Dr. Wosencraft and his "associates" modest request to haye 
the Colorado Desert turned over to them section by section 
and township by township. From my stand-point this is one 
of the most infamous bills ever presented to a legislative body. 
"This is the unkindest cut of all"; the idea of turning the Coh)- 
rado Desert over to a lot of hungry land grabbers; and it at the 
same time susceptible of being made to produce more agricul- 
tural wealth than was ever ruled over by Queen Cleopatra and 
all the Ptolemies. Why the Colorado Desert can be made easily 
the most fertile spot on the planet; it can be made to resemble 
a patch in the planet Jiipiter, which, according to the Flamariau 
speculations, there is neither fall winter or summer, but "eternal 
spring." 

It has often occured to me that this thoughtless American 
people were criminally indifferent in allowing themselves to be 
bereft of their patrimony; but it seems that God arms the 
thoughtless and harmless. 

For wait till the great leveling machine goes to work, and 
you will see the fruits of their corrupt practices torn to ashes 
in their grasp. Verily, "Justice travels with a leaden heel, but 
strikes with an iron hand. God's mill grinds slow but dread- 
fully fine." Wait till the great leveler goes to work, and a big 
head of water is turned on, and you will see the fruits of in- 
famy and corruption dissappear as fog before a heavy gale from 
the north. It will batter down infamy and corruption faster 
than all the corrupt, venal and incompetent men in high places 
can build it up; that is, with a few honest and capable men lo 
oppose them. Why will it do so much ? Because it will strike 
a death blow to land monopoly and give material prosperity to 
the industrial and laboring classes. The S. F. Examiner well 
says that "all evils naturally follow in the train of poverty; and 
history teaches us that it is almost impossible to elevate the in- 
tellectual and moral nature of a nation without first improving 
its material condition." Under the pei'nicious, wasteful and 
thoughtless system which agriculture is now prosecuted, and 
the land being held in such large bodies, oftentimes by non- 
residents, the real agriculturists and the agricultui-al laborer 
are so cast down by having to make such a severe struggle for 
existence that they have no time or inclination for reflection, and 
fall an easy prey to demagogues and corruptionists. Put these 



46 

same people on the road to prosperity, and you will see quite a 
different order of things. 

My impression from reading the San Francisco papers is, 
that that little Spring Valley Water monopoly is a weariness 
in the flesh of the citizens thereof ; entering, comparatively, in 
a small degree, into the occupation and affairs of her citizens, to 
what it will into the pursuits of the legitimate agriculturist 
whose almost every naomeut will require water. Water mo- 
nopolies, if allowed to be fastened upon the agriculturists, will 
prove intolerable. The idea should not be entertained for a 
moment. It would be a disgrace to humanity; an abomination 
in the sight of the Lord. It would be subversive of the spirit 
of liberty, independence, progress, manhood and good con. 
science. My experience has given me the impression, whether 
well founded or not, that monopolists and corruptionists go 
hand in hand. And what kind of a country would California be 
to live in, provided there were a hundred little Spring Valley 
Water Monopolies scattered throughout the State ? This ini- 
quity should be strangled in its infancy. I think the District 
plan, such as that known as the "West side irrigation scheme,"' 
gotten up to water the country from Tulare Lake to Antioch, a 
wise and good arrangement, and a plan that will do well to 
adopt throughout the great valley. Districts should be em- 
powered by the Legislature to condemn all irrigation works and 
water rights necessary throughout the State. According to 
my calculation, it only requires five per cent, of the landed re- 
sources of the great valley to raise as much produce as has ever 
been raised in it in one season; and, from close observation, I 
am of the opinion that there is plenty of water for every acre of 
land in the valley. If this theory is correct, then there is cer- 
tainly a great abundance of the raw material out of which to 
build up this new agriculture. And assuming the District plan 
of irrigation in operation, whereby people can have their pro 
rata of water for the cost of construction and maintaining their 
irrigation works, there never was a better opening for mankind 
in general to go into legitimate agriculture. But the idea that 
I wish to impress upon the people is, that when they happen to 
have 320 acres of land, such as the average land of this valley is 
and the use of ten feet of water per second when necessary, that 
they have by no means a farm yet. Neither has the foundryman 
an engine, simply because he happens to have ten or fifteen tons 
of iron on one side of his shop and as many tons of coal on the 
other; but he has the wherewithal, by using considerable labor, 
capital and skill to make one, 



.47 

THE BEST LOOATIOIT FOR THE NEW AaHICULTURE. 

In seeking a proper location for the new agriculture, there 
are a few material points to be considered : One is, the soil or 
sand should be at least four or five feet deep over the bedrock or 
hard pan. It is not absolutely necessary that the soil should be 
fertile (for we know how to render anything in the shape of 
soil fertile) ; pure sand will do, or greasewood; sage brush or 
alkali soil is good enough. The sand dunes around San Fran- 
cisco, by having the use of the water of the Spring Valley Com- 
pany, can be converted into a model farm, more fertile and pro- 
ductive than Mussell Slough. Six or seven miles to the east- 
ward of Virginia City, Nevada, is a splendid location for it, for 
the reason that here you have a large city at a great elevation, 
and an unlimited amount of what can be built up into the most 
fertile lands (the Humboldt desert), by putting iu a flume and 
by using the snow water from Mount Davidson, and the winter 
rains, and sending down the sewage water from Virginia to the 
edge of the desert, which would furnish fertilizing material for 
at least 10,000 acres, and then by bringing the waters of the 
Carson around to meet it, and by cultivating these 10,000 acres 
as heretofore so carefully directed, there would be a laud over- 
flowing with milk and honey, a veritable cornucopia. TheHam- 
boldt desert, by utiHziug the waters of Carsou and Truckee, can 
be made to produce annually more agricultural wealth than was 
ever produced in one year in the great valley of California. 
Vegetation can be made to grow in that climate, and through- 
out the great north, almost as well in winter as summer, by 
clothing their fields in winter with ice "as with a garment." 
There is nothing original in this ice clad business ; but until 
the great leveler goes to work it is impracticable. Put that to 
work, and on the foundation it lays you can pile up the com- 
bined wisdom of ages, and it will fit as though made to order. 
Nevada, when she elects to embrace the new agriculture, will be- 
come great in wool growing, stock raising and dairy products. 
Her immense deserts can be made as productive as the polders 
of Holland, and the place to begin that work is near Virginia, by 
using the town sewage. The produce consumed there for the 
last twenty years could have been raised at the enormous profit 
of ten per cent, per month on the investment, and been furnished 
for about one-half the prices obtained there. But we all despise 
wisdom and love folly. Well, we have been drinking deep, deep 
of the latter, haven't we? This system of agriculture is just as 
well adapted to New York, Pennsylvania and the New England 
States as it is to the great valley of California ; in fact, it is at 



48 . 

home wherever land and water are brought together, as has 
here been so carefully described. 

Put the great levelers to work and we will have no more 
winter, no more summer, no more fall, but eternal spring. 
Through that the land can be covered with fatness, and pover- 
ty and destitution driven forth o'er the wilderness. The ex- 
hausted fields of New England or the great West would be a 
charming location for us. Only give us a small stream of wa- 
ter, under heavy pressure, and a stream of eight or ten feet per 
second, and we will soon lay the foundation for you, and then 
it is plain sailing. It's all in the foundation. Get that right, 
and all will be right. 

AGRICULTURISTS 

will become successful just so soon as they begin to employ 
water as a servant. It can be made a servant more valuable 
than all the rest of the auxiliaries of the farmer, put them all 
together, and almost without cost; nothing but the harness and 
it will cheerfully perform the vilest drudgery about the farm 
in the most dexterous manner, and for the portion of any des- 
ert where greasewood and alkali abound in the soil, the land 
to be prepared, as heretofore directed, in all cases, and the river 
water simply allowed to run over in a broad and shallow stream, 
not more than one inch deep, until all the ingredients in the soil 
inimical to plant life are cast out and thrown off, and in all 
cases, if the water is allowed to run long enough, you will have 
spontaneous meadows of the most nutritious wild grasses to 
cover the entire surface of the ground that is properly prepared. 
So you see we are not particular as to the quality of the soil. 
The land should be on an incline, not less than four nor more 
than ten feet to the mile, if convenient. But it can be used at 
a great deal more or less. The west side of the San Joaquin or 
the west side of the Sacramento, when they elect to embrace 
the District system of irrigation, will be most magnificent loca- 
tions for the new agriculture, imaginable. In Stanislaus Coun- 
ty or San Joaquin County they are agitating the subject of 
bringing out irrigation canals, and when they go to work in 
earnest there will be a good location. I hope they will all elect 
to embrace the District system. I think it will be much better 
for all. There is no speculation in either land or water ; at the 
rate we have been progressing it will take the people of the 
great valley of California until the year A. D. 1900 to utilize 
fifteen per cent, of the land and water in the valley. People 
will find out when they go to work systematically to using wa- 



49 

ter, tliat they cannot make large farms profitable ; and they 
will find out that the higher state of cultivation they put their 
land in the better it will pay, or rather, the larger will be the 
per cent, on their money. There is more profit in the judicious 
use of ten feet of water per second, when they really need it, 
than there is in owning a large canal and depending on selling the 
water. To have the use of ten feet of water, when needed, will 
not probably amount to more than one foot per second constant- 
ly. The great profit aud speculation, henceforth, will be right 
where it ought to be ; that is, in the labor. For instance, if a 
company purchase 320 acres of land, say for $5 an acre, which 
will be considered a fair price when people begin to find out 
what their land is really worth, and it costs $5 an acre to put 
water on it, which, when people begin to understand them- 
bclves, they will think a very extravagant price, then there is 
a chance for a speculation in building this land up to the high- 
est state of fertility. Land can be made to return $200 an 
acre profit annually, when unimproved lands alongside of it will 
not be worth more than $5 an acre. I am satisfied that if laud 
in England can be made worth $220 per acre rent for six 
months' occupation and crops, although their markets are a 
great deal better than ours, we can make our land in twelve 
months earn $200 an acre profit by being up w ith the times in 
every way. In the new agriculture 820 acres is as large as a 
farm ought to be to work to the best advantage, and from that 
down to five acres, every acre in alfalfa, calculate on keeping 
four cows. Cows, pigs and chickens can be kept economically 
together. Now to use sheep instead, of cows ; fifty sheep can 
be calculated upon to the acre, and the manure crop of the 
sheep would be as valuable to the farmer as the wool crop. To 
a great many it will be a great mystery where the profit comes 
in so largely in the new agriculture. It can be answered in a 
word : "Economy." And the way in which the sewage water 
is here used it has about the same effect on the land as saliva and 
gastric juice has to the human economy. And again, in the 
trifling matter of plowing, to raise as much off one hundred in 
the new as off a thousand in the old way, we will have to raise 
two crops a year ; consequently, we will have to plow our 
one hundred acres twice in the same year, one foot deep; and to 
plow one acre with a sulky plow, that cuts two feet of a furrow 
each round, our team of three fine horses will have to travel 
four miles, and to plow one hundred acres four hundred miles, 
will have to be traveled ; and to plow one hundred acres twice 
in a year the tesun will travel 800 miles. Now the farmer who 



60 

cultivates 1000 acres ia the ordinary way, providing he uses 
the sarae kind of plows and teams, his teams will have to travel 
4,000 miles. Here we save 3,200 miles' travel for our teams. 
Now we economize nearly in the same ratio in everything. The 
coming farmer is going to be educated for his calling ; the 
shepherd will not be given a team of fine horses to lAow, but 
&, man • skilled in that occupation will be put at it ; he will be 
well paid, well fed and given steady employment the year 
round, and will be expected to do big, manly work. When 
sheep are used instead of cows, not more than onp-half of the 
employees will be needed, perhaps ; and at that rate, to draw 
out the full resources of the great valley of California, an army 
of 450,000 farm laborers will be required. Inaugurate th's 
system of agriculture and it will abate more evil than anything 
imagiuable, and the whole country will enter upon an era of un- 
exampled prosperity. Extensive manufacturing will follow as 
a natural consequence. There is nothing impracticable about 
it. It's true it's about 4000 years ahead of the times in which 
we live, but it's the nearest road out of our difficulties, and we 
can't aiford to sit down and wait for that time to roll over us. 
The great valley of California is good for one of two things 
♦-that is, for the highest possible style of agriculture, or good 
for nothing; but is pre eminently adapted to either. The pros- 
perity of California is couched in these ten words: "A thin 
'sheet of water in motion Over the land.'' That's the way this 
writer defines irrigation proper. Now there are many shrewd 
and wealthy men up the valley that have thrown up any 
amount of levees and checks, looking like breastworks for Von 
MoUke's army, which they fill with water, some portion of the 
ground two feet deep and over, and think they are irrigating. 
That is vanity. If these same gents were to see " irrigation 
proper" once, and found out the virtue there is in it, they would 
open their eyes. What they call irrigation is very little to be 
preferred to the old plan of farming without the use of water. 
The disposition to overrun and hold in subjection "The whole 
boundless continent" is almost irresistible to "Los Americanos.'^ 
This disposition, though, is being and will be literally starved 
out of him. As aforesaid, it is profit for which we are laboring. 
Now, in the pursuit of agriculture, it is the large crop ou which 
the profit is made; for instance, in raising wheat, it takes sevea 
bushels per acre to pay expenses. Now if we raise ten bushels 
to the acre, we make three bushels profit off an acre of ground; 
and if we raise one hundred bushels to the acre, our profit is 
ninety-three bushels to the acre. Under the new system it 



51 

costs very little more to plow the land than under the old. The 
reason we plow the land one foot deep is to get a chance for 
burying our stubble and vines, for the purpose of using- them 
for facilitating irrigation and drainage; but for that, wo would 
not do it, and for seeding and heading it costs no more under 
the new than old system. To go to work to make an argument 
in favor of the new agriculture, seems to me like going to work 
to prove that the sun shines in the middle of the day. There is 
no getting around it, California is bound to embrace it, and the 
sooner the fact becomes generally known the better for every 
one. Here now, in the San Joaquin Valley, on account of the 
drouth, bankruptcy, ruin and desolation are holding high carni- 
val, and at the same time there are a dozen or so rivers running 
into the valley, either of which would have furnished water 
enough this season, had the new agriculture been in operation, 
and their water brought out on to the plains and utilized, not 
only to have had every head of stock in the valley sleek and fat, 
but to have raised more produce than ever was raised in it in 
any one season. But the great leveler must precede irrigation; 
for instance, at Borden, they have a stream of water at work 
there now that is fifteen feet wide and twenty inches deep, and 
their laud prepared for irrigation (after their fashion), and all 
that big canal can irrigate is thirty acres a day, of twenty- 
four hours. Now put the leveling machine to work, and pre- 
pare that same land for scientific irrigation, and a stream en?- 
half of the size there used would be ample to irrigate 320 acres 
in the same length of time. Since commencing this writing I 
have read a notice in the papers that the citizens of San Joaquin 
Co. have wisely concluded to avail themselves of the district plan 
of irrigation, and intend to build a canal out of the Stanislaus 
River for the purpose of irrigating their vast plains. I think 
they mean business. If my impression is correct, I would say 
to all persons wishing to engage in agriculture that they 
might not easily do better than by joining their fortunes with 
those of the enterprising people of San Joaquin Co., as it is pos- 
sessed of many advantages, the most important one being 
the good sense displayed by her citizens in embracing the dis- 
trict plan of irrigation. I think it a great boon to live amongst 
intelligent people. And, again, it is right in the market; and, 
again, the Stanislaus is a muddy stream, consequently holding 
much fertility in solution. There is plenty of room in that 
one county under the new agriculture for all; for bo it remem- 
bered that we only require four hundred and fifty thousand 
»cxes of land to raise as much produce per annum as has ever. 



52 

been raised in one year in the great valley. But San Joaquin 
County is an old settled country, and the laud there is all un- 
doubtedly held by private parties that may not vrant to part 
with it on reasonable terms. But when they go to irrigating 
scientifically, they will find out there is very profitable em- 
ployment for from five to ten times the number of agricultural 
laborers hitherto employed; but I would advise no one to settle 
on land where the water was held by private corporations, aa 
they will be eternally liable to vexatious impositions. 

Stanislaus County, that adjoins San Joaquin, should the citi- 
zens avail themselves of the district plan, is a fine field. Her 
shifting sand plains, by running the water of the Tuolumne out 
on to them, through the new agriculture, could be rendered im- 
mensely productive. 

I think the district plan of irrigation is as much to be pre- 
ferred to the private corporation plan as freedom is preferable to 
slavery; and think the latter plan capable of impeding the prog- 
ress of a community as much as the institution of slavery 
checked the progress of the Southern States. I have studied 
the subject carefully, and advise people to avoid it, although 
"time was" when I was strongly in favor of slavery; but now 
that it is abolished, nearly all of us look upon it as having been 
a curse to all parties that had anything to do with it. Now 
land and water monopoly will be looked upon very soon in the 
same light. Just as soon as people go to farming in a sensible 
manner, land monopoly will fall of its own weight, never to rise 
again; but, perchance, should people now engaged in other 
businesss want to embark in legitimate agriculture, they 
would very likely have to pay fancy prices for land, for un-. 
doubtedly nearly all the land is "gobbled up." But "Babylon 
is falling," as witness his Majesty, the great ex-grain King, has 
fallen like an immense Italian pine. Now if his late Majesty 
had kept out of land and water monopolies, like a prudent grain 
King, doubtless to-day he would have been all "hunkadora." 
The newspapers intimate, in i*elation to Mr. Friedlander's down- 
fall, that irrigation has fallen far short of what was expected 
of it. Well, I should say it had. That's just what's been the 
matter with this writer for the last twenty years ; and if his 
Majesty's bosom friends had only kept Iheir clutches ofi" of 
me and mine seven years ago, the great calamity, that is now 
carrying everything before it, would have been carefully 
guarded against, and would have fallen harmless on a country 
strongly fortified against its ravages at all points. But no; 
there was supposed to be immense wealth and much honor to 



53 

be gotten out of what I was in the rightful possession. De- 
cidedly too nrmch, as those supposed-to-be minions of this grain 
King thought a poor man ought to have and to hold, and fools 
must needs rush in where angels tread cautiously. Now I 
guess some of these ex-Kings realize the force of Captain 
Mace's remark, that "Irrigation is something that the Ameri- 
can people know very little about." And if they had only let 
me alone for a little while— T was close upon the track of it — I 
would have solved this irrigation problem. What the people 
needed seven years ago they need to-day — that is, to be shown 
how to prepare their land so as to make irrigation practicable, 
and consequently profitable. All the rivers in the State may 
betaken out in canals, and until the people are shown as above, 
irrigation will not be worth the keeping the canals in repair. 
Now, when I commenced operations, seven years ago, to run 
the water out of King's River, I more than suspected what has 
since been learned by experience, that there was a very knotty 
point in regard to making irrigation a success to be unraveled; 
but your great Kings must needs rush headlong, and grab up 
everything of the kind in the valley. 

But wbslookest thou on yon gray tower; the owner is forsooth a gentle- 
man and j»,'^'n%t. But yesterday he and his men * • * Butwer. 

And in 

Conclusion 

. T would say that for about seven years before coming to 
King's River I had literally slept in irrigation ditches cut by 
my own hands, in Umatilla County, Eastern Oregon, only leav- 
ing there when obliged to obtain the necessary supplies. From 
having to work most of the time alone, I was brought in close 
communication with mother earth, and studied the open book 
of nature with the utmost diligence to find out the secrets of 
cutting canals and irrigating land to perfection, as it was indel- 
ibly impressed on my mind that in that direction the carcass 
was to be found, and on coming hero and seeing the situation, 
I w^s confident that this was the finest field for the exercise of 
my skill in that. line possible to be found in America; I thought 
I could perform Wonders, and was extremely anxious to show 
what could be done with water. Now I am certain that had 
it not been for land monopoly and its attendant infamies, that 
the experience, enthusiasm and desperate energy brought to 
bear by me upon irrigation in 1870, such an iraj)etus would 
have been given to it here in the King's River country that it 
would have been irresistible, and that the waters of all the 



54 

rivers of the great valley -^rotlld now "be running Ont on to their 
respective plains, and the same people who are now "sitting in 
the dust" would be joyful and happy, and could defy the scourge 
that now threatens them with famine and ruin, for all that was 
needed to b? done I was fully able to do (barring the incubus 
above referred to). To run water in large quantities out into 
the middle of the desert above referred to, w.s the first thing 
to be done, and then it was just as absolutely necessary to show 
people how to prepare their land so as they could raise 50 or 
, 60 bushels to the acre, and at the same time build their land up 
into a high state of fertility, all of which, with my former ex- 
perience and severe application, I would soon have been pre- 
pared to do. Now these old and foolish would-be kings, that 
caused my occupation to bo wrested from me, took possession 
of the property with about the same ideas that had deluded me 
Bome ten years before — that is, that all that was necessary to 
make irrigation successful was to run water out into the midst 
of the plains, and cry out to the farmers: Here's land and water, 
come and buy, raise your 50 to 70 bushels of grain to the acre. 
And now, forsooth, irrigation has not come up to what was ex- 
pected of it. It was not until after I was "crush^.d -'^Jb," and 
had taken plenty of time for reflection, that I co. .? clearly see 
the reason why farmers were so slow to take hold of irrigation. 
Now I would say to all communities contemplating the con- 
struction of irrigation works to go ahead, that they are spend- 
ing their money wisely and legitimately; for without' water 
they cannot draw out mox-e than ten per cent, of the capacity 
of their land, and with it they can work it up to its fullest capa- 
city—but would say to them for God's sake not to allo^V them. 
B3lyes to follow in the tracks of many of their predecessors. 

From reports, Messrs. Haggin and Carr, of Kern County, 
have undoubtedly been very successful in irrigating, under 
what circumstances I do not know, and am very certain it has 
been a great success at Mu3?ell Slough, for reasons heretofore 
set forth, and balievc it has been a pai'tial success at Borden, 
wlisro farmers are allowed to use a large stream of water; but 
on the average laud of the great valley I believe success has 
only been attained on paper, and kept up at a cost so as to sell 
lots Avhilst the excitement was tip. 

Now that the people of California are awakening to the ne- 
cessity of irrigation, the most important thing is, that they go 
at it understandingly. But I would say to them, sail in, cut your 
canals; but by all mean^, be.'bre you go to work thoughtlessly. 
and allow yourselves to become disgusted with it, take a scru- 



55 

tinizing look arotlnd tlie country,' and see what has actually 
been accomplished through its agency, and how it is being 
done. But I am satisfied that if the California farmers hit 
upon tl^e right plan of irrigation, nothing will astonish them so 
much as their wonderful success. Go to Cache Creek, Yolo 
County, where I was baptized with fire and water between 
seventeen and tw nty years ago, where my good friends, the 
Hoppin Bros., tried this levee and check system of irrigation 
(that some people at this day pride themselves in), and aban- 
doned it. Go, if you please, to Walla Walla Valley, where fif- 
teen years ago this writer cut a ditch for the purpose of irri- 
gation and floating wood to the town and fort in the above 
valley, with his own hands, with a pick and shovel, which con- 
ducted a large stream of water, not less than ten feet per sec- 
ond, a distance of four or five miles. Ask Messi-s. Bigham, 
Stetson, Col. Moore, Reub. Baskett and a dozen other promi- 
nent citizens whether I didn't complete it, and how much sport 
was made of me for having done it. Go to the Umatilla mead- 
ows, about forty miles from there, and you will see as substan- 
tially constructed and well located irrigation ditch as there is 
on the Cvnig^u. Ask Frank Maddock (then Sheriff of Umatilla 
County), the i.aufmans, the Wilsons, the Mitchells, the Rue 
family, and Mr. Job ; ask fair Tennessee, Jn <j. Bradburn, the 
Short family, and Col. Page, agent for W., F. & Co., Judge 
Bailey and Jonathan Swift ; ask Dr. Teal and my friend, M. 
Ainsa, Jr., in whose store the office of my company (The Uma- 
tilla Canal Company, incorporated l863j was located. Now 
all these good people were my friends and wished me well, 
but not a dollar could I get one of them to invest in my scheme. 
Some of them 1 uxghed at mc, and more of them berated me for 
wasting my energies on what seemed to them an impracticable 
enterprise. Many said to me that I appealed to be a man of 
ordinary intelligence in regard to other matters, but, thee 
was no use in talking, I was certainly a "little off" on the sub- 
ject of cutting ditches, and advised mc to go to the mines and 
use one-half of the energy that I displayed on the "Meadows," 
and they would guarantee thac I would make my "pile." Now 
there was as much nesd for irrigation there at that time as 
there is to-day in California ; for when I commenced cutting., 
that canal barley was worth from two to ihree cents per 
pound, and then there were but few small patches, scattered 
through the "Meadows," that were moist enough to raise vege- 
tation of any kind. As it is a well known fact that eas'.era 
Oregon is a rainless district, inore so than the " VVcst side" in 



56 

Califoraia, and there was a large sage plain on the outer edge 
of the meadows of about 10,000 acres, that my ditch, when 
oompletecl, would command every acre; and I calculated on 
people raising at least sixty bushels of wheat 6Y barley to the 
acre on eveiy acre of it. After I had gotten it fairly com- 
pleted and people would not buy the water of me, and by rea- 
son of the completion of the C. P. R. R., the trade that sup- 
ported the town of Umatilla being diverted, times were vei'y 
dull, and no prospect of their reviving soon, I left that country 
and came back to California. 

I liked the people of Umatilla County as well as any people 
with whom my lot had ever been cast, and I was extremely 
anxious, so long as there was a prospect of making a success of 
my ditch, to get it completed, and show my friends the error of 
their ways for having laughed at me so much. One of the 
most intelligent and successful operators in that community 
told me that if I ever made a success out of the ditch business, 
that I conld command him in all things; that he would follow 
blindly wherever I would lead. That was the feeling of many 
of them; consequently I used untiring energy to get my water to 
running out on to the meadows, and as my means were very 
small, I studied quite as hard as I worked to take every possi- 
ble advantage in locating and constructing it, and since com- 
ing down here to Centerville have continued the study in the 
same direction, and think so effectively that I can show up 
something original in construction of such canals as that pro- 
jected on what is termed the "West Side Irrigation District,'* 
or in doing the heavy woi'k necessary in getting the water of 
the Sacramento River out on to the Colusa plains, that will 
lessen their cost much more than half. I am certain that I 
can furnish them plans that they could not choose but accept. 
Now for these impoverished districts to complete these great 
■works, some originality will have to be brought to bear. If I 
can get a chance I will show them something original in the 
way of constructing irrigation canals, that these great engi- 
neers we read of in India, Egypt and elsewhere, can't hold a 
candle to; and not only that, lean show them how to utilize 
the water at every step, after I get it out far enough from the 
source so that it can be used, to as high as tate of perfection as 
will be attained at any time within the next six thousand years. 
And if those "grave and reverend seniors," Mayor Bryant and 
the Honorable The Board of Water Commissioners of San 
Francisco, will give me a job, just to show what virtue there 
is in intense application and study in one direction, for seven- 



teen years, I think I can show them more about water in a 
week's time than they have learned all summer traveling over 
the hills. I am strongly of the opinion that I can make it 
very apparent to them how they can introcluC6 a stream of 
water as large as the Croton Aqueduct supplies, with a privi- 
lege of as much more as they want delivered on th6 hills of 
their city, four hundred feet above tide water, and at a cost 
of not to exceed ten million dollars. 1 am not entirely certain 
that I can do this thing; but 1 think the chances are fully ten 
to one that I can. 

It looks to me to be simply disgraceful to see the immense 
amount of loss being sustained at this time in this valley; here 
are to be seen hourly, sheep and cattle men driving their stai-v- 
ing herds to and fro in every direction, like a lot of crazy men, 
not knowing what to do or where to go; and bands of sheep 
whose wool clip would amount to $2 anually, each, had they 
sufficient food, can be bought at this time all the way from 10 
to 50 cents- per, head. Now, if legitimate, or in other words 
common sense agriculture were inaugurated, 5,000 head of sheep 
could be kept on 320 acres of land, and what they would eat 
would not be missed, but in reality would add wonderfully to 
the productive capacity of the land, enough at least, to pay for 
all the care and feed bestowed upon them. Now running 
water out on to thfe plains alone will not nearly correct this 
giant evil; that is an important part of the Work, however. 

Now there are many intelligent gentlemen in this community 
who own thousands of acres of land with ditches of water run- 
ning bank full through their laud, and their flocks starving, and 
they making no effort to save them by raising feed for them, 
for the reason, no doubt, that they think it would cost more 
to raise produce for them by means of irrigation than their 
stock would be worth. Now some of these gentlemen are my 
friends, and would like, the best iu the world, to put me at 
something that I would be available for, and I have tried hard 
to induce some of them for the last two or three years to fur- 
liish me the means to go to work and prepare two or three hun- 
dred aci'es of their land for scientific irrigation, and put it down 
in alfalfa, so that tliey might never again be annoyed ou ac- 
count of feed for their stock; but my ideas were too novel and 
long drawn for them. Now novel and long drawn as my ideas 
may seem, but I have studied, as I think, every conceivable 
plan to prepare land, and it is the only practical plan I can 
think of. 



58 

.-Ifc seepas as.thcmgh aril of «s who have as yet had anything to 
do- Avith irrigation have invariably fallen in to the same error, and 
that all that was necessaiy to be done was to cut the canals 
find get the water once to running through on the highest pai't 
of the land, and then Ave -would have immunity from all the ills 
that agriculture was heir toj now nearly all the people in this 
community who have acted on this erroneous idea, after getting 
the water to running through their lands as aforesaid, after trying 
itj tllorough^y and finding it wanting, abiindonad it, and seemed 
well satisfied to let it drop at that. But I was too much the loser 
to give it up in that manner; was too strongly committed to it; 
in fact I was deeply imbued with the idea that there was a royal" 
road to success if I could find it, and have went ahead, sunk to 
the bed-rock and struck it fabulously rich, and now all that is 
necessary is to develop om? of these mines of wealth and let it be- 
come generally known that people with no very large amount 
of skill and intelligence can make 6 per cent, per month off of 
their savings, and at the same time have their money in as safe 
a place as the Safe Deposit Company, and you will see thou- 
sands of men with small means and strong arms rise up as if out 
of the ground, ready to. embark in enterprises of this character 
and it Avill come to pass that what we have looked upon as a 
curse (the rou^h and rebellious character of the soil) will turn 
out to be a most wise and merciful provision of the Creator, in 
that it will certainly develop here in California some of the 
greatest engineers that the woi-ld has ever seen; as boys from 
the age of ten years and upwards will, of necessity, be com- 
pelled to take notice of and exercise their minds on engineering 
problems, in assisting in preparing- lands, and it is a most inter- 
esting and attractive study. I do not think it a great blessing 
to live in a country v/here we have to make little or no strugi 
gle for CTcistence; but I think it very fortunate that there is to 
be opened up a safe standard and profitable employment for all, 
and that theic is to be a field thrown open where all can ente>' 
and obtain a competency in a reasonable length of time by 
using prudence, industry and economy. 

!N^ow if I have succeeded only in putting the people of California 
on inquiry into the neceBsi'y of preparing their land before 
they attempt to irrigate it, I will flatter myself that I have ac- 
complished something of importance; for, without that, I very 
much fear that irrigation will not accomplish what is expected 
of.it, and that people of other communities will reap uo more 
benefit from it than our people on King's River have done. 
For I am satisfied that people have only to be made aware of 



59 



that fact, aftd that that is the only thing that stands in the way 
of success; that they will not be long in finding out the bsst 
possible means of overcoming this impediment. But, I will 
say, without fear of contradiction, that the problem ol how to 
prepare land for scientific irrigation, in the cheapest and best 
manner possible, is the most important one for the agricultur- 
ists of California or any other country to solve, and would say 
that if any man discovci's a better plan than the royal road I 
have pointed out, I will be the first one to hail him as a public 
benefactor; for I firmly, believe that the want of it is responsible 
for most of the calamity that is now raging in the land. 

And before closing, I would say to the laboring and industrial 
classes of California, and the immigrants newly arriving in the 
country, that there is a good time in store for them; but do not 
be in a hurry in investing your small means. There will be 
an immense surplus of the raw material centuries hence in Cali- 
fornia and elsewhere, out of which to construct the new agri- 
culture. California is larger by 2,003 square miles than Japan 
and we are told that one-sixth of the area of the latter country 
supports a population of thirty-three million; now the "new 
agriculturists are compellecl to work their land up to as high a 
state of cultivation as these Japanese, or any other nation. 
"Why, simply that they may make the largest percentage off 
their money; consequently, when people go to work in earnest, 
and bring a little common sense to bear on agriculture, they 
vill find out that they need but a small portion of the immense 
surplus of the land and water. The great trouble now is, there 
are so many people owning, right in the heart of the country, 
tracts of land varying m size from thirty thousand to two hun- 
dred thousand acres; but "Babylon is falling," and wait till the 
great leveling machine goes to work, and the bottom will soon 
be washed out from under it entirely. And I would furthermore 
remark to these same people, when they read stunning advertise- 
ments advising people how they may make their fortune so rap- 
idly, and without using either skill or effort, like such "enter- 
prises" as the Gulf of California Oyster and Canning Company of 
"Professor" Blacklock, or this California Central Colony, I 
would advise them, before investing iheir sm:ill savings, to look 
before tbey leap, and would say to all (hat t'lC poorest land in 
the great valley can, through the new agriculture, be built up 
into greater productive capacity than the now famous Kern 
Island, or Mu^sell Slough; alfalfa, Avater and diversified farm- 
ing will do the work. 



60 

The qnestion occurs to me, what will the pioneers of the nineteenth 
century not have accomplishecl for civilization? Here we have 
the raih'oad, the telegraph, the steamboat, and now comes "Time's 
noblest offspring," the groat leveling machine, and the discovery of 
the art of agriculture. The two latter will have the startling effect 
of increasing the productive capacity of the planet tenfold, and, 
through their instrumentality, mother earth will henceforth yield up 
her abundant fruits with about one-fifth of the labor hitherto re- 
quired. 

The 20th century will certainly develop a superior civilization, as 
from jDresent appearances it is to be ushered in under auspices the 
most favorable, and is to take quiet and peaceable possession of anal- 
most entirely new world — a world just fairly emerged from barba- 
rism (in an agricultural point of view) — a world of the sustaining 
capacity of ten of the old worlds we have been hitherto scratching 
over superficially. Now, after a struggle of six thousand years with 
ignorance, prejudice and oppression, we have but just discovered 
its wonderful capacity, and the bast possible msans of developing 
it. 

Poverty and destitution they will not have to contend with, fts 
there will be an inexhaustible field for all to enter and obtain a com- 
petency. 

Why, the great desert of Sahara, by utilizing the waters of th« 
Nile, can be made to support sumptuously the present sparse popu- 
lation of the world, besides maintaining, in the highest possible con- 
dition, all the tame cattle of the earth. 

Here we have a world filled to repletion of the raw material out of 
which wealth, food and raiment may be created. With millions 
upon millions of capital lying idle, with thousands of able-bodied 
and willing men out of employment, many of them in destitute cir- 
cumstances, put the great leveling machine to work, and you will 
see that Shakespeare was right, three or four hundred years ago, 
when he said that "Ignorance is the curse of God, and knowledge 
the wings with which we fly to Heaven." 

The New York Graphic says of California, "Its young men are 

bidden to go east, go west, go north, go south, go to the to 

seek their fortunes, and they do go, and the State drifts that way." 

_ It assigns, as a reason for all this, that we haven't the intelligence to 
utilize the Chinese labor amongst us. Now it is very apisarent to 
me that land monopoly and the pernicious, unnatural and barbarous 
system of agriculture that now obtains, is the cause of all our woes; 
and what is true of California, excepting land monopoly, is also true 
of New York, Pennsylvania and all the sisterhood of States. 

Let the farmers, north, south, east and west, learn to utilize the 
abundant water they have among them, as has herein been so care- 
fully directed. Then will "the winter of their discontent be made 
glorious summer." 

Centreville, Fresno County, Cal., April 15, 1877. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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